Posted on 12/05/2016 5:51:23 AM PST by george76
Jesse Worley threatened to sue Microsoft. He’s not the first to take on the Redmond company, but his move to take legal action had a purpose. He wanted Microsoft to acknowledge that aggressively pushing the Windows 10 update was a problem. Customers weary of the Windows 8 disaster were unwilling to take the upgrade leap; Microsoft was, he reasoned, ignoring their fear of heights.
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I’m an IT tech whose grandfather’s computer was updated through subterfuge, which made life harder for him and his caretakers until it was fixed
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Privacy advocates dislike it, as Microsoft collects data such as voice input, text input, website history, and more. There are ways to limit the personal information Microsoft receives, but these steps likely aren’t known by the average Joe. The growing privacy concerns have called out security experts, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and even France’s National Data Protection Commission.
Is this data-mining the fuel that powered Microsoft’s aggressive Windows 10 upgrade program?
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The tactics Microsoft employed to get users of earlier versions of Windows to upgrade to Windows 10 went from annoying to downright malicious,” the EFF said in August. “Some highlights: Microsoft installed an app in users’ system trays advertising the free upgrade to Windows 10. The app couldn’t be easily hidden or removed, but some enterprising users figured out a way. Then, the company kept changing the app and bundling it into various security patches, creating a cat-and-mouse game to uninstall it
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As Worley pointed out in his email, he’s likely not the only one who suffered from Microsoft’s seemingly malicious upgrade scheme.
(Excerpt) Read more at yahoo.com ...
Personally have spent more time un-doing MS upgrades than actual hassle free computing.
Aps for your smart phone are just as bad with the auto updates. Programs dont need to update themselves every 24 hours or re-write the kernle to work today vs. yesterday.
Bought a new laptop last week and despise windows 10 and all the bloatware that was installed.
Will be stripping it off and installing Mint in a few days.
Agreed. I stopped auto updating of my Win 7 about a year ago just to keep away from this Win 10 thing and MS data collection. Zero problems. I use McAfee anti virus to keep it bug free.
If it works, don’t fix it.
After using Linux as a server for years, I recently installed an Ubuntu desktop. It has nearly everything I need, and runs flawlessly.
I upgraded three of my computers to Win 10. Two were Win 7 and one was that POS Win 8. Although I waited to the last minute, all three upgrades went nearly flawlessly and Ive had no problems since. The one problem I did have was losing some exported Garmin Basecamp files on one PC but, fortunately, I had those backed up.
Right on schedule.
I used this and have never had a problem since:
https://www.grc.com/never10.htm
Free, and it worked immediately.
If you don’t want Windows upgrades, move to Linux or a Mac. Windows upgrades are mainly designed to keep you safe online. If you can’t figure out Windows 10, you won’t stand a chance against a scammer or adware or ransomware.
I know I haven't cleared as much as possible and I know Microsoft can silently turn these setting back on (they have so on occasion for earlier adopters). I also know that Microsoft has several concerning things that can't be turned off (at least one port communicates back and forth to Microsoft with unknown encrypted information) and, of course, updates are immediately mandatory upon reboot.
Microsoft screwed over my Windows 7 laptop, but I did manage to keep it from ever installing Windows 10. However, my Windows Updates haven't worked since late June 2016 and I have about tried all the technical fixes.
I simply want to pay Microsoft $100 for a clean update to Windows. Microsoft refuses to do this, because it thinks the Google model where the customer is product to be sold is more valuable. That may be true, but how can anyone be okay with every word, every keystroke, and every mouse click being funneled to the Microsoft Cloud, This can happen with Android to a large extent, but at least people know that's what is happening.
With the video camera also tied in as it is, what is to keep Microsoft from turning it on “to better understand your home environment to enhance your advertisements?” This kind of thing happens with Facebook, whereby a “new” privacy setting becomes available because they found a new way to undo your privacy which they hadn't previously informed us of. Of course, the default is “share everything with everyone” until you log in, find the hidden control, and turn it off.
It is all crazy.
We will be dual booting when I get the time. Mint is our most likely Linux distribution, and it supports Secure Boot, I understand.
Microsoft has squandered so much to achieve so little for the long term.
Its stupidity simply boggles the mind.
A bit late, shoulda been the first reply...
I long for the days of XP! Still have it on one of my puters, but no upgrades or security anymore. So, I don’t use it much.
I’ve been a Microsoft user since 1995. I currently own three laptops that each (XP, Vista, Windows 7) have been upgraded to their sequels, and my desktop which still runs Windows 7.
Windows Vista and 8 drew me closer to the decision I made when 10 was announced. That is I’ll be switching to a new OS as soon as Microsoft no longer supports Windows 7. I’m still investigating how to change the OS to Linux and will sacrifice one of the laptops to do it before I commit my desktop to that OS.
I am leaning toward Mac for a desktop as I’m done buying any laptops.
I’d love to get in contact with you about how to make that conversion. I looked into it and went as far as downloading a copy to disk but I got stuck on initiating the installation.
My FR account is too new to use the Private Reply option so I won’t be asking for or submitting any contact info, but try to keep me in mind. I want to make the switch so that I can begin to use the new OS.
Or if you just can’t stand the execrable Metro GUI, install Classic Shell (free) and it will work like Windows 7 and you’ll never see that crap again.
Never had a problem when I had XP or 7. But, ever since I started using Windows 10, nothing but problems with scammers and ransomeware! Had to pay twice to get the sh*t removed!
All I had to do was say no. OK my home desktop didn’t take to the registry hack so I had to say no every day. But the wife’s machine and my work desktop took it fine, no upgrades, no nagging, still not on 10 today on any machine.
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