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Microsoft accidentally reveals that it is testing ads in Windows Explorer
- twoxproblematic 5y ago
- madaxe_again 5y agoFileman is still an option. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/windows-file-manager/9p7vbbbc49rb?activetab=pivot:overviewtab https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/windows-file-manager/9p7vb...
- kuroguro 5y agoI guess using and older version of explorer, or a free one from ReactOS could be a way around it. Another option is to use the server editions of Windows which come with a lot less of this kind of crap. There's also Ameliorated Windows, tho questionable in legality and comes with poor documentation and some quirks due to the amount of features cut out.
- canistel 5y agoI just want to see ReactOS reach Beta. Get a modern browser working in ReactOS. And then we dual-boot happily ever after.
- jsnell 5y agoDiscussion from 3 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30675908 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30675908 But also, this is not the first time this has been tried. 5 years ago(!): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13903519 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13903519
- dang 5y agoThanks! Macroexpanded (just the recent ones): Microsoft says Win11 Explorer ads were ‘not intended to be published externally’ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30701289 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30701289 - March 2022 (21 comments) Latest build of Windows 11 has ads inside File Explorer - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30689526 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30689526 - March 2022 (12 comments) Microsoft is testing ads in the Windows 11 File Explorer - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30675908 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30675908 - March 2022 (498 comments)
- perihelions 5y ago10 years ago! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4558049 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4558049 ("Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed") (2012)
- oehpr 5y agoI like this post from aphextron: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13904319 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13904319 I think this is just the price we are going to pay for "evergreen" operating systems. As a consumer, you now only buy Windows once. Microsoft has to make up for these lost sales so it makes sense. hahahaaaaaa Time makes fools of us all I suppose.
- Nbox9 5y agoI started daily using non-windows OS in 2004. Ever since then I’ve been finding more and more ways to remove Windows from my life. I work for companies that use macOS —- I use proton to play video games —- I have found alternatives for virtually every application I run. I occasionally use a public computer, a friends computer, or interact with systems that run on Windows Embedded. I feel as if this journey has given me a deeper understanding of computers (a valuable skill), it has definitely provided me with more enjoyable user experiences and a more productive computational environment. My response to being exposed to non-Microsoft software was to migrate towards it. I do not understand why this response isn’t more universal.
- spaceisballer 5y agoI personally appreciate the insight. I don’t have a desire to purchase Windows ever in the future. I’m waiting on my turn to buy a Steam Deck and want to see how well that does for gaming, which is really the last barrier for me going to Linux. I’m more akin to a regular computer user outside of work. Browsing, playing games and occasionally editing pictures or documents. All which can be done easily (and usually for free) on Linux.
- toastal 5y agoOr can be done in the browser, which is platform agnostic and no reason to feel tied to any platform you disagree with.
- chopin 5y agoGood luck, now you are dependent on Google. Browsers have the exact same problems as OSes, unfortunately. I exclusively use Firefox where I can but at least at work it is becoming more difficult lately.
- EasyTiger_ 5y agoI've started taking Linux for gaming more seriously since the Proton devs managed to fix a stuttering issue in Elden Ring. Would so love to completely remove Windows from my life.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Shadonototra 5y agoNo wonder the army doesn't want Hololens, microsoft became a very lazy and low quality software company And it's not just Windows11, it is everything else: https://www.neowin.net/news/leaked-memo-reveals-microsoft-isn039t-too-cheery-about-its-hololens-deal-with-the-us-army/ https://www.neowin.net/news/leaked-memo-reveals-microsoft-is...
- unicornfinder 5y agoIt really reminds me of that interview with Steve Jobs from the 90s where you can tell just how frustrated he is at Microsoft's success with what he describes as really "third-rate" software.
- blibble 5y agowas there ever a point in history when MS were known for anything other than producing mediocre (at best) quality software?
- BipolarCapybara 5y agoI know nowadays it's very commont to pick on Microsoft, but they've delivered quality products, and even if you don't like Windows (I don't love it) it's a pretty decent operating system with lots of backwards compatibility. Excel is great. Visual Studio is great
- blibble 5y agoVisual Studio didn't hold up to its competitors in the past (Delphi) and doesn't hold up to its competition now either (JetBrains) it's another fine example of MS software being mediocre at best whilst modern Windows is malware
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- moltke 5y agoEvery time I have to use Windows I think my memory of it is some exaggerated negative tribal thing and I'm always surprised that it's far worse than I remembered. Gnome sucks but it's still better than this, and with a very minor amount of effort you can use Linux without Gnome.
- boredumb 5y agoWasn't too long ago that unity was being packaged with ubuntu including an amazon ad.
- mrabcx 5y agoWhy don't they add a 'Donate' button as well as which can pop up at regular intervals and people can donate extra as they wish ?
- philliphaydon 5y agoIs this in prep to just make Windows free and make money from advertising instead? To deal with pirated windows or those who don't want to pay? Or use those illegal cd key sites?
- toyg 5y agoLike those items were impacting MS in any meaningful way - they've not really been significant since the introduction of online activation. No, it's just an attempt at finding new revenue streams for something that is in the process of being commoditized. Linux/Android/ChromeOS (yes yes, spare me the pedantry) are free and increasingly good enough to fully replace the traditional OS for most tasks, which puts pressure on everyone else to squash prices to zero. Apple could commoditize the OS because they sell hardware; MS cannot do it without a significant revenue hit. Their pivot to online services is working, but still, when they finally pull the plug on desktop licenses they're going to feel it. So they're in a perennial quest to find new income sources for that division.
- reaperducer 5y agoMicrosoft has talked about subscription operating systems for a long time. At least decade, probably more. Perhaps this is the fallback if your credit card on file in Windows expires so that you can still access your stuff when your monthly Microsoft tax comes due.
- shmde 5y agoYou know that majority of laptops come pre-installed with windows and the price of windows is already added to the laptop MRP ?
- philliphaydon 5y agoBuilding computers in asia is popular because it’s cheaper than a prebuilt. I’ve seen computers in the shops in Taiwan, Singapore, and other countries which have “activate windows” icon because people don’t pay for it.
- donmcronald 5y ago
- INTPenis 5y agoYou know more than 1000 great games can run on Linux thanks to the Steam Deck. And the movement of Linux gaming has gotten a lot of traction. Just saying...
- Jensson 5y agoGames aren't fungible, especially when it comes to multiplayer with friends.
- phendrenad2 5y agoYeah I don't think that there are 1,000 "great" games in the universe.
- Karsteski 5y agoThat's great and all, but irrelevant if the game I want to play doesn't run or run well on Linux. I have friends, I'd like to play with them. They certainly do not care about Linux proselytizing, when at the end of the day after work, all they want to do is play games, but fiddle around with why some update broke a game that previously worked via Proton.
- digitallyfree 5y agoHonestly dual-booting with Linux and Windows on your workstation is perfectly feasible nowadays. Just treat the Windows partition as your "game console" and only use it for games (and avoid the hassle of WINE). Otherwise do everything else on the Linux side. If you want you can use disk encryption and VLANs to segregate the Windows install for security/privacy reasons. Obviously if you need other Windows applications like Photoshop or Office this mentality doesn't work, but I've convinced people who want Linux and games to go this route. They just treat the Windows partition like an Xbox or Playstation.
- phendrenad2 5y agoThere are downsides. First, it's an advanced technique not recommended for novices (too easy to destroy one OS or the other). Second, Windows will want to install updates every time you boot into it. I generally recommend... just having to computers.
- tempnow987 5y agoQuick question - I'd love to migrate (or at least allow option to migrate for those who want to) from Windows. However, we are dependent on Office (Word and Excel). Any recommendations on the best folks to pay on the libreoffice side to squash some formatting bugs etc for complex word docs. I filed the bugs (or found them). But it's hard to move over until we can get of office. If we could port some vba code over even better. Alternatively was looking at google docs which seems a bit re-invigorated - historically as high complexity word users it didn't have the features we needed (sections, styles, styles in tables with alignment details for numbers etc) We have some VBA we can work around I think (or in Libreoffice perhaps replicate or even surpass).
- QuikAccount 5y agoHonestly I'd recommend Google Docs but the truth is, if you are an Excel power user there is really nothing quite like it without taking that next jump into SQL or something like Python/R. Google Sheets will let you use SQLite though which is cool.
- A4ET8a8uTh0 5y agoI personally am starting to feel that tools are secondary and restrictions imposed by the office environment come first. You want to be able to jump between them as needed, because heavens know my place won't let me openly use Python.
- bko 5y agoGoogle's version of Excel has come a long way. Worth checking out again. The thing you're missing though is the shortcuts which are very important for heavy Excel users. I never understood why the open source excel clones didn't focus on shortcuts. If they could build an interface to map your own, someone could create a shortcut profile to mimic Excel, or even your own shortcut profile. That would be a game changer
- aksss 5y agoEven the shortcuts on Mac are different for Excel. Sounds crazy (maybe is crazy) but that’s a jarring blow to productivity and surely intentional. If you have used excel for any length of time, you really depend on shortcuts. I probably store them in the same memory registers as the Contra cheat codes, never to be forgotten.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- qiskit 5y agoMessage box: DO you want to watch this 2 min ad in order to browse your filesystem? [Yes] [No]? Who am I kidding, why would they even give us the option. Microsoft said they were looking to put ads in their software and I guess they are following through on it. Instead of the blue screen of death, we'll get the blue screen of ads.
- pomian 5y agoI think you are correct. Bit you just used the wrong command. I think better use case: you will watch this 2 min ad in order to browse your filesystem, ok?
- cbfrench 5y agoIf you wait too long to respond, Clippy pops up: “It looks like you’re having trouble cooperating as a willing participant in enforced consumerism. Would you like some help?” > Yes. > Yes, please.
- wlesieutre 5y agoThe search box is a favorite place for Microsoft to stuff things that you don't want while pretending it's trying to present you with useful information. Wouldn't you like to have some autoplaying video ads in there?
- qiskit 5y agoEven better, just play the ad and after the ad finishes, give the user a quiz on the ad to make sure he was paying attention. If you score 80% on the quiz, then you can browse the filesystem. Otherwise, they have to watch the ad again. Dark arts/dark patterns. I think microsoft just emailed me a job offer. Decisions, decisions.
- sonicanatidae 5y agoThere is already "work" being done to detect the user's eye focus. If the user looks away from the ad, the ad pauses, until the user refocuses on their garbage. Granted, for now, it's 20 mins of ads for free tickets, and it makes sense. We also know humans don't understand the word, "enough" when it comes to profits. https://futurism.com/moviepass-eye-tracking-ads https://futurism.com/moviepass-eye-tracking-ads
- itronitron 5y agoI can't think of a clearer signal that Microsoft considers Design a second class citizen.
- albatross13 5y agoShameful, but not surprising. The moment I noticed Windows 10's start menu connected to remote services (or tries to search the internet for you? Fuck if I know what it's trying to accomplish), if an internet connection was present, is when I knew this was coming. Super bummer.
- TameAntelope 5y agoThis article just seems like rage bait to me, tricking the anti-Microsoft crowd into giving Ars clicks. So many things get killed before they're launched, and I'm so sure this would test absolutely abysmally if it were introduced into any paid for version of their OS, it's almost silly to think they'd just slip this into Windows 11 Home or whatever. Maybe it's part of a potential new "free OS" offering, where you get Windows 11 for free, but with ads. I don't think that's terrible. I think it's at least seeing if it would work, writing up some code to get a feel for how it looks, both technically and from a marketing perspective. Just seems like a great way to get a specific crowd riled up about something that will never see the light of day in any meaningful sense that would affect that crowd.
- blibble 5y agoI mean... there's already ads in explorer https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.vox-cdn.com%2Fthumbor%2FLOmqhIFXDipU2ImONNF-m6d_GQ8%3D%2F0x0%3A900x600%2F1200x800%2Ffilters%3Afocal(378x228%3A522x372)%2Fcdn.vox-cdn.com%2Fuploads%2Fchorus_image%2Fimage%2F53622319%2F1.0.jpg&f=1&nofb=1 https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2F... and: - ads on the lockscreen - ads as notifications - ads in the start menu - ads in the "change file association" dialog - ads in the apps (e.g. solitaire) heaven forbid we critisise Microsoft for these things
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- TameAntelope 5y agoHeaven forbid we wait to see if Microsoft actually does this before criticizing them...
- EasyTiger_ 5y agoLet's keep quiet then and just allow them to add more ads with no pushback.
- Tenoke 5y ago
- t_mann 5y agoafaik Windows 10 falls under the definition of malware since its release (downloads & installs further software without asking you), I assume the same will hold true for Windows 11, so this would only seem logical
- criddell 5y agoThat's not the definition of malware.
- unsupp0rted 5y agoWhy would an advertiser want to show you ads while you're navigating your file system, looking for a file? What's the buyer intent in that moment? The goal would have to be brand recognition, but the risk/reward ratio must be absurd, in terms of damaging one's brand. It's basically advertising like this: http://i.imgur.com/Ubip3Gq.gif http://i.imgur.com/Ubip3Gq.gif
- moritonal 5y agoCan you imagine the advertising value if Windows could offer an advertiser the file types you were looking for, the installed apps you had, and the app you "normally" open the file with. If someone's searching for code-files, has VisualStudio installed, and normally opens it in VS-Code, then Rider would love to advertise in that space. It means the user want's professional tools, but doesn't use VS for some reason. If someone's searching for architecture programs, has various pro tools installed, but is likely to open a sketch in essentially paint then you've once again got a huge advertising opportunity, especially if mixed into some "Would you like to, buy|try -> install -> open" this file in this advertised app in one-click?
- martin_a 5y agoIf only the Creative Cloud would run on Linux, I could completely get rid of Windows this evening. And I'd love to, after seeing this here. But the only option would be to use Mac OS, I'm not sure I want to get into that ecosystem either.
- Tijdreiziger 5y agoI think the remaining 'killer apps' that Windows has are basically creative software (Adobe, Ableton, etc.), games, and Microsoft Office.
- at_a_remove 5y agoI am out of "contacts" for this sort of thing and it looks like I will need to find someone else who will let me buy LTSB/LTSC Enterprise licenses. I think it's the only way out of this madness.
- andrewnicolalde 5y agoWindows is malware.
- ortusdux 5y agoI find myself coming back to this Steve Jobs quote more and more: "It turns out the same thing can happen in technology companies that get monopolies, like IBM or Xerox. If you were a product person at IBM or Xerox, so you make a better copier or computer. So what? When you have monopoly market share, the company's not any more successful. So the people that can make the company more successful are sales and marketing people, and they end up running the companies. And the product people get driven out of the decision making forums, and the companies forget what it means to make great products. The product sensibility and the product genius that brought them to that monopolistic position gets rotted out by people running these companies that have no conception of a good product versus a bad product. They have no conception of the craftsmanship that's required to take a good idea and turn it into a good product. And they really have no feeling in their hearts, usually, about wanting to really help the customers." Creatives build companies, and if you are not careful, sales will destroy them.
- 1_player 5y agoFunny that the current Apple CEO is more of a "sales" than a creative guy.
- microtonal 5y agoI don't see why that is relevant. The point was that if companies have a monopoly in a product category, improving the product doesn't make the company more successful. Since macOS and iOS do not have a worldwide monopoly, Apple (and thus Tim Cook) have to improve the product for the customer to gain more marketshare. I think Apple's problem was that one designer that was a fan of excessive minimalism wasn't matched enough by a counterforce. Now that Ive is gone, Apple takes a more functional approach to product design. E.g. the MacBook Pro has useful ports again.
- qqtt 5y agoProbably helps that Tim Cook was mentored by Jobs himself for more than a decade and personally saw the rot set in at IBM first hand.
- everly 5y ago
- icu 5y agoThis will force me to migrate to Ubuntu. I've been growing more and more reluctant upgrading from Windows 10 to 11 because of all the surveillance but I will never use an OS that embeds ads.
- timbit42 5y agoI recommend Linux Mint over Ubuntu.
- onemoresoop 5y agoWindows should live in a VM at best and accessed for a few indispensable apps, not even allowing it internet access. But who am I kidding? There are masses of hostages to Windows, many showing signs of Stockholm syndrome.
- nashashmi 5y agoThese are not ads.. These are corporate service promotions. Like Google occasionally has in the homepage. Not ads where other companies are paying for the advertising of their services. If this is an ad, then pop up notifications are ads. (they aren't). I once saw a one drive notification in explorer. This is OK because they are sister services. Editor however should not be in explorer because it needs to run on office.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- RappingBoomer 5y agothis is why i am not gonna buy another desktop when this one goes down for the count...just gonna go to my cheap android tablet that cost me $69...and when that one goes down, I will just put out $59 or whatever for the next one...so long to expensive computers...for good..
- wildpeaks 5y agoI don't know which short-minded executive keeps pushing for these ads in Windows, but they are directly sabotaging the golden goose and the goodwill that took a painstaking amount of time and money to regain in the last decade.