7 ms·

You can't embrace open source, stand for freedom on the Internet, and simultaneously engage in dark patterns like this without destroying user trust. And trust

You can't embrace open source, stand for freedom on the Internet, and simultaneously engage in dark patterns like this without destroying user trust. And trust with users is the currency of the 21st century as much as data is the new oil. Microsoft needs to get their brand straight and decide, once and for all, what they stand for. There was this incredible move towards open source, and embracing the modern web, and so many positive developments. I think myself, and many other technologists, were going, "Wait, is this is the same company that shoved IE down our throats for years and got sued for anti-competitive practices?" It was glorious, and shocking. All of that is now at risk so that some product manager can look good by driving enforced but entirely fake adoption of Edge — that should be nipped in the bud and a clear message sent that this era is over — from the top executives. Or I supposed they could do nothing, and then it truly is sending a clear message as well. But perhaps not the one Microsoft intends to send, or the one that would benefit the company in coming years in terms of staying inside the good graces they have managed to create.

sneak 4y ago
A proprietary software company never makes a "move toward open source". Microsoft released some things with source simply to sell more proprietary software that does not respect user freedoms. Open source and free software is a philosophy and ideology. Microsoft is incompatible with it no matter what licenses they use. Microsoft never embraced open source. You can't claim that until and unless Windows is released with source as free software, which will Never Ever Happen.
- m463 4y ago
  embrace -> embrace and extend https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis...
- geodel 4y ago
  > You can't claim that until and unless Windows is released with source as free software, which will Never Ever Happen. That would wouldn't change a thing even it happens. No one except Microsoft is going to be expert on 50 million lines of windows code and contribute meaningfully to it. Add to that contributor's licensing agreement, community behavior, sheer capacity to make API changes and get it accepted. It will be impossible to create alternate certified Windows distribution even if all source code was available.
  - LocalH 4y ago
    Not immediately, no. But what about in 25 years?
- waboremo 4y ago
  Open source and free software are separate things, despite how much they're used interchangeably.
- SllX 4y ago
  That’s more of a free software mentality. Open source is just open source; Microsoft has some open source software, they use some open source software, but they are in the business of selling proprietary software and free software as Stallman defined it is antithetical to that.
- mistrial9 4y ago
  MSFT is indeed embracing open source -- prediction -- a polluted and key-controlled Debian will be inside the next OS, filled with Azure management python packages and adware. Second, Canonical as indentured servent, will deliver anything that Redmond requests as snapd, with phone-home welded ON and more expiring keys. You are not the customer here. You are a cog in an industrial machine. It is the executive management that has power, and you will know it every day. MSFT will sell your management the tools you are required to use every day.
tempodox 4y ago
Obviously their dark patterns are not sufficient to drive away enough users and this has been the case for decades. Nothing new to see here, it's the same old Microsoft of yore.
- bobthepanda 4y ago
  I mean with desktop OS systems you've got * macs, which cost an arm and a leg and aren't necessarily better if you've got an axe to grind against corporations with dark patterns * chromebooks, where you have even less choice over the matter * various flavors of Linux, which have never quite gotten to 'grandma uses it and it just works with the apps she likes' Interestingly SteamOS is quite nice, but will it be something outside of gaming on a Steam Deck?
  - stinkytaco 4y ago
    > Interestingly SteamOS is quite nice, but will it be something outside of gaming on a Steam Deck? Considering their website[1] still says it's Debian derived but they switched to Arch some time ago, I doubt it's in their plans to do more than enable their own hardware. [1]: https://store.steampowered.com/steamos https://store.steampowered.com/steamos
- helmholtz 4y ago
  Maybe not enough, but certainly some. I'm not a software person, and yet my personal machine now runs linux, exactly _because_ of Microsoft's wankery with no local accounts, uninstallable Edge, Cortana, news on the fucking taskbar, and the shitty Windows 11 with its shitty taskbar. Fuck all that noise. Life is calm and great in linux land.
- than3 4y ago
  That's because they have backroom deals with the manufacturers. Its impossible to compete when the manufacturers are actively hostile and don't provide the firmware/code/specs in a way that the hardware can be supported independently. Some even use this to spy under an umbrella of plausible deniability, there was an article just recently about Qualcomm chips that did this (checked in) at the firmware level.
ghostly_s 4y ago
Many of us kept our trust rating for MS right around zero despite their "embrace of open source"; it seems we were correct in recognizing it as nothing more than a recognition of market realities packaged up as a marketing ploy.
- beerpls 4y ago
  It’s not just about trust, MS is outright hostile. Hostile UI, hostile business practices, hostile legal and growth endeavors At this point i’m not hust distrusting MS i’m actively doing anything I can to support their demise
  - out-of-ideas 4y ago
    aren't all these providers-of-things hostile in about (all ways) or at least most ways than not hostile ways? MS, Apple, Google, Amazon, FB, Adobe, IBM... they just want money; where's the money? <insert stewie+brian>
    - beerpls 4y ago
      I feel the same about them all, tho MS google and fb all top the ranks imho
  - jones6ofMont 4y ago
    [dead]
- trinsic2 4y ago
  Embrace and Extend.
  - javcasas 4y ago
    Ya forgot Extinguish. Microsoft didn't.
- lallysingh 4y ago
  So.. how does everyone feel about their stuff on GitHub right now?
grey_earthling 4y ago
> Microsoft needs to get their brand straight and decide, once and for all, what they stand for. They stand for weary resignation. Same as Google and Amazon. For most people, they're just there, and you can't not use them, so what can you do? They can be as dodgy as they like, because when you point out what they're doing, most people will just be confused about why you're complaining, because you may as well be railing against the fact that rain is wet.
- jmartrican 4y ago
  Add Adobe to that list.
  - staunton 4y ago
    Add every single big company in the world to that list.
- trinsic2 4y ago
  LOL, you are so right on that, average users do not understands the issues at hand about this, we need some kind of movement that better explains the issue.
  - rtsil 4y ago
    And yet average users fled IE en masse as soon as they had a (back then) good alternative. There is still hope!
    - grey_earthling 4y ago
      I'm not sure they fled IE as such. They saw a link (advert) on Google that said “make your internet better” and they clicked it. Yes, some techies actively chose Chrome knowing full-well what the alternatives were, but I'm pretty sure the advertising produced much greater numbers. (Also, the techies who enthusiastically recommended Chrome were the same ones who enthusiastically recommended Twitter a few years later, and are now enthusiastically recommending Signal — which illustrates the quality of their judgement when it comes to monopolies.)
Arch-TK 4y ago
"Wait, is this is the same company that shoved IE down our throats for years and got sued for anti-competitive practices?" Really though? It was that easy? On my shit-list it's definitely way above Facebook, Apple, and Google. A company which has on so many occasions made my life harder and caused me to suffer. I would qualify Microsoft as irredeemably horrible, I can't imagine what they would have to do to make me consider changing my opinion of them.
xg15 4y ago
> And trust with users is the currency of the 21st century as much as data is the new oil. Is it? The cynic in me feels that the actual currency is "engagement" - how many consumers can you keep on your platform. Providing a great and trustworthy service is one strategy to archieve this, but by far not the most effective or reliable. The big players very much seem to prefer a captive audience (through network effects, vendor-controlled hardware, closed ecosystems, etc) that cannot switch away no matter how much they personally dislike or mistrust the platform.
panic 4y ago
It’s impossible for an organization the size of Microsoft to behave according to a consistent set of values. Don’t rely on their “good graces” for an instant.
than3 4y ago
Microsoft is no better than an accounting firm at this point. The only reason they are still around is because of the data collection from spying on their users, and malign and coercive practices that are illegal but remain unenforced probably due to some backroom deal they made regarding the former. They had a few good ideas early on, and now that open source isn't patent bound (not gonna get into the rediculousness of UI software patents that have been granted where they never met that bar of novel, useful, and non-obvious [grouping items is somehow non-obvious?]).,
- bobbylarrybobby 4y ago
  No, the reason they're around is because probably 95% of businesses in the US rely on their software in one form or another.
  - than3 4y ago
    Bobby, If you take that statement you just made, and take it just one step further, asking a why is that when they haven't really innovated in 20+ years? The realistic answer to that is exactly what I just said. Alternate revenue streams.
l0b0 4y ago
> Microsoft needs to get their brand straight and decide, once and for all, what they stand for. Money. How would it be possible for an absolutely gigantic company to stand for anything else?
dheera 4y ago
> Microsoft needs to get their brand straight and decide, once and for all, what they stand for. Actually, they don't. People will continue to keep buying Microsoft regardless of how shitty their products and policies are. Nobody was ever fired for picking Microsoft. When Microsoft products have issues, people blame Microsoft, but when anything else has issues, people blame the IT person who chose that product. The result is everyone picking Microsoft to shift blame away from themselves.

sneak 4y ago

A proprietary software company never makes a "move toward open source". Microsoft released some things with source simply to sell more proprietary software that does not respect user freedoms. Open source and free software is a philosophy and ideology. Microsoft is incompatible with it no matter what licenses they use. Microsoft never embraced open source. You can't claim that until and unless Windows is released with source as free software, which will Never Ever Happen.

m463 4y ago
embrace -> embrace and extend https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis...
geodel 4y ago
> You can't claim that until and unless Windows is released with source as free software, which will Never Ever Happen. That would wouldn't change a thing even it happens. No one except Microsoft is going to be expert on 50 million lines of windows code and contribute meaningfully to it. Add to that contributor's licensing agreement, community behavior, sheer capacity to make API changes and get it accepted. It will be impossible to create alternate certified Windows distribution even if all source code was available.
- LocalH 4y ago
  Not immediately, no. But what about in 25 years?
waboremo 4y ago
Open source and free software are separate things, despite how much they're used interchangeably.
SllX 4y ago
That’s more of a free software mentality. Open source is just open source; Microsoft has some open source software, they use some open source software, but they are in the business of selling proprietary software and free software as Stallman defined it is antithetical to that.
mistrial9 4y ago
MSFT is indeed embracing open source -- prediction -- a polluted and key-controlled Debian will be inside the next OS, filled with Azure management python packages and adware. Second, Canonical as indentured servent, will deliver anything that Redmond requests as snapd, with phone-home welded ON and more expiring keys. You are not the customer here. You are a cog in an industrial machine. It is the executive management that has power, and you will know it every day. MSFT will sell your management the tools you are required to use every day.

tempodox 4y ago

Obviously their dark patterns are not sufficient to drive away enough users and this has been the case for decades. Nothing new to see here, it's the same old Microsoft of yore.

bobthepanda 4y ago
I mean with desktop OS systems you've got * macs, which cost an arm and a leg and aren't necessarily better if you've got an axe to grind against corporations with dark patterns * chromebooks, where you have even less choice over the matter * various flavors of Linux, which have never quite gotten to 'grandma uses it and it just works with the apps she likes' Interestingly SteamOS is quite nice, but will it be something outside of gaming on a Steam Deck?
- stinkytaco 4y ago
  > Interestingly SteamOS is quite nice, but will it be something outside of gaming on a Steam Deck? Considering their website[1] still says it's Debian derived but they switched to Arch some time ago, I doubt it's in their plans to do more than enable their own hardware. [1]: https://store.steampowered.com/steamos https://store.steampowered.com/steamos
helmholtz 4y ago
Maybe not enough, but certainly some. I'm not a software person, and yet my personal machine now runs linux, exactly _because_ of Microsoft's wankery with no local accounts, uninstallable Edge, Cortana, news on the fucking taskbar, and the shitty Windows 11 with its shitty taskbar. Fuck all that noise. Life is calm and great in linux land.
than3 4y ago
That's because they have backroom deals with the manufacturers. Its impossible to compete when the manufacturers are actively hostile and don't provide the firmware/code/specs in a way that the hardware can be supported independently. Some even use this to spy under an umbrella of plausible deniability, there was an article just recently about Qualcomm chips that did this (checked in) at the firmware level.

ghostly_s 4y ago

Many of us kept our trust rating for MS right around zero despite their "embrace of open source"; it seems we were correct in recognizing it as nothing more than a recognition of market realities packaged up as a marketing ploy.

beerpls 4y ago
It’s not just about trust, MS is outright hostile. Hostile UI, hostile business practices, hostile legal and growth endeavors At this point i’m not hust distrusting MS i’m actively doing anything I can to support their demise
- out-of-ideas 4y ago
  aren't all these providers-of-things hostile in about (all ways) or at least most ways than not hostile ways? MS, Apple, Google, Amazon, FB, Adobe, IBM... they just want money; where's the money? <insert stewie+brian>
  - beerpls 4y ago
    I feel the same about them all, tho MS google and fb all top the ranks imho
- jones6ofMont 4y ago
  [dead]
trinsic2 4y ago
Embrace and Extend.
- javcasas 4y ago
  Ya forgot Extinguish. Microsoft didn't.
lallysingh 4y ago
So.. how does everyone feel about their stuff on GitHub right now?

grey_earthling 4y ago

> Microsoft needs to get their brand straight and decide, once and for all, what they stand for. They stand for weary resignation. Same as Google and Amazon. For most people, they're just there, and you can't not use them, so what can you do? They can be as dodgy as they like, because when you point out what they're doing, most people will just be confused about why you're complaining, because you may as well be railing against the fact that rain is wet.

jmartrican 4y ago
Add Adobe to that list.
- staunton 4y ago
  Add every single big company in the world to that list.
trinsic2 4y ago
LOL, you are so right on that, average users do not understands the issues at hand about this, we need some kind of movement that better explains the issue.
- rtsil 4y ago
  And yet average users fled IE en masse as soon as they had a (back then) good alternative. There is still hope!
  - grey_earthling 4y ago
    I'm not sure they fled IE as such. They saw a link (advert) on Google that said “make your internet better” and they clicked it. Yes, some techies actively chose Chrome knowing full-well what the alternatives were, but I'm pretty sure the advertising produced much greater numbers. (Also, the techies who enthusiastically recommended Chrome were the same ones who enthusiastically recommended Twitter a few years later, and are now enthusiastically recommending Signal — which illustrates the quality of their judgement when it comes to monopolies.)

Arch-TK 4y ago

"Wait, is this is the same company that shoved IE down our throats for years and got sued for anti-competitive practices?" Really though? It was that easy? On my shit-list it's definitely way above Facebook, Apple, and Google. A company which has on so many occasions made my life harder and caused me to suffer. I would qualify Microsoft as irredeemably horrible, I can't imagine what they would have to do to make me consider changing my opinion of them.

xg15 4y ago

> And trust with users is the currency of the 21st century as much as data is the new oil. Is it? The cynic in me feels that the actual currency is "engagement" - how many consumers can you keep on your platform. Providing a great and trustworthy service is one strategy to archieve this, but by far not the most effective or reliable. The big players very much seem to prefer a captive audience (through network effects, vendor-controlled hardware, closed ecosystems, etc) that cannot switch away no matter how much they personally dislike or mistrust the platform.

panic 4y ago

It’s impossible for an organization the size of Microsoft to behave according to a consistent set of values. Don’t rely on their “good graces” for an instant.

than3 4y ago

Microsoft is no better than an accounting firm at this point. The only reason they are still around is because of the data collection from spying on their users, and malign and coercive practices that are illegal but remain unenforced probably due to some backroom deal they made regarding the former. They had a few good ideas early on, and now that open source isn't patent bound (not gonna get into the rediculousness of UI software patents that have been granted where they never met that bar of novel, useful, and non-obvious [grouping items is somehow non-obvious?]).,

bobbylarrybobby 4y ago
No, the reason they're around is because probably 95% of businesses in the US rely on their software in one form or another.
- than3 4y ago
  Bobby, If you take that statement you just made, and take it just one step further, asking a why is that when they haven't really innovated in 20+ years? The realistic answer to that is exactly what I just said. Alternate revenue streams.

l0b0 4y ago

> Microsoft needs to get their brand straight and decide, once and for all, what they stand for. Money. How would it be possible for an absolutely gigantic company to stand for anything else?

dheera 4y ago

> Microsoft needs to get their brand straight and decide, once and for all, what they stand for. Actually, they don't. People will continue to keep buying Microsoft regardless of how shitty their products and policies are. Nobody was ever fired for picking Microsoft. When Microsoft products have issues, people blame Microsoft, but when anything else has issues, people blame the IT person who chose that product. The result is everyone picking Microsoft to shift blame away from themselves.