Microsoft still a loathsome company

[smilodon]

I'd slightly softened towards Microsoft over the last year or so. Being a Windows 10 user already  their disgusting behaviour with the Upgrade to Windows 10 nags and auto downloads didn't directly affect me. It should have but we get lazy with our contempt whn we're not being targeted specifically.

However the New Windows 10 Anniversary Update reaffirms Microsoft as the bottom feeding scum they are. As a Windows 10 Pro user I was able to use the group policy editor to prevent the worst excesses of Microsoft's harvesting of my information, pushing of crapware onto my system and other such invasive nasty behaviour.  But after the update certain group policy features will be turned off in the Pro version as well as some registry keys becoming locked.

• We'll lose the ability to turn of Microsoft Consumer Experience which is basically Microsoft's ability to push 3rd party apps onto our machines such as Candy Crush etc.
• Also gone is the less serious ability to turn off Tips, annoying but they weren't that invasive to start with.
• We can no longer bypass the lockscreen and any notifications (read spam announcements) it contains which messes with the startup process and gives Microsoft another window to monetise us.
• Gone is the ability to disable all Windows Store Apps. Apart from the weather app which is actually decent everything else is just bloatware and I got rid of it long ago. So back it all comes with this update.

So there's Microsoft for you. None of these changes can possibly be said to make my user experience better. They simply give Microsoft more control over my operating system.I know many companies are pretty grubby in how they operate and undermine their users freedoms and choice to line their own pockets on a regular basis. I'd just forgotten how bad Microsoft really are and how they know that as a near monopoly holder they can stomp on their users in such a blatant and obvious way.

I guess there must be some people daft enough to actually like Microsoft stuff and want to use it out of choice (and yes Office, OneNote and Outlook are decent business apps) but these people must be pretty few and far between and deserve pity not scorn. Also there are many people who unlike us have no idea about what scummy things Microsoft does, nor do they care. They just want to use the Facebook and the email.

But for anyone who actually cares about their operating environment and who would want to keep some control over it then it's a sad day come the anniversary update.

[Neys]

I'm still kind of happy with the update service disabled I seldomly reboot, rather always hibernate the thing and I didn't get an update for at least half a year. Let's see how long it will run without updates. Up to now I didn't observe any issues.

Disclaimer: I use this PC only for gaming, and so I can afford not getting important updates. I definitely wouldn't do this if I'd use the PC for more serious things.

But yes, I agree with your points against M$, they really ****ed me off in the last years.

[albert]

I always like your stories Smilo, but now I'm more confused then I was before. In 2 lines what does one have to do to stop them forcing this upon us?

[smilodon]

Buy a Mac!

[albert]

Great, and run the same windows on it so I can play games, and get the updates.