A few days after Microsoft released Windows 10 to the public last year, Teri Goldstein’s computer started trying to download and install the new operating system.
The update, which she says she didn’t authorize, failed. Instead, the computer she uses to run her Sausalito, Calif., travel-agency business slowed to a crawl. It would crash, she says, and be unusable for days at a time.
“I had never heard of Windows 10,” Goldstein said. “Nobody ever asked me if I wanted to update.”
When outreach to Microsoft’s customer support didn’t fix the issue, Goldstein took the software giant to court, seeking compensation for lost wages and the cost of a new computer.
She won. Last month, Microsoft dropped an appeal and Goldstein collected a $10,000 judgment from the company.
We accept so much crap from software makers, so it feels good if someone manages to get back at them for the terrible quality of software in general.
This is so, so good. I love it when the courts get it right like this.
And the sad thing is, Windows 10 isn’t a bad OS overall. Yes, the telemetry crap is disconcerting, but most of that can be turned off (and all of it on Enterprise and Server versions). The real issue with Windows 10 is Microsoft’s increasingly scammy ways of pushing it on their customers.
Imagine being a freelancer in the middle of a presentation to a new client, and suddenly your laptop reboots and starts installing the upgrade. Not only can you not stop the upgrade without potentially hosing the OS, you end up suffering the ignominy of your computer making you appear to have no sense of what you’re doing. You look bad before your potential new clients, likely losing a contract worth a month’s salary or more.
Or let’s say you use a Windows 7 PC as a controller for a CNC machine and you’re in the middle of a project. The update begins, reboots the PC, and now you’ve ruined a piece of work that may cost you a couple thousand dollars in time and materials to have to redo.
That kind of bullshit is why Microsoft deserves to have hundreds of thousands of these lawsuits brought against them (screw class action, small claims like this are the only way the individual will get just compensation). I hope they start feeling the burn soon.
I can understand their motive into creating a “unified” ecosystem starting with Windows 8, but they… removed features and ergonomic design for this purpose.
Windows 7 is not just good enough, I don’t loose time trying to identify where my flat title or scroll bar is located because of lack of contrasting color.
At least in XP you could change the theming completely, in 7 you could select the old fashioned Windows 2000 that was easily identifiable.
Now with 10, without a third party product, you’re out of luck. I hope they’ll not to pretend it is to save hard disk space, that would be just silly.
Well, in WinXP it saved CPU/Memory to use the old-style Win2k theme. XP’s silly bubble theme took up a lot of extra resources.
In Vista/Win7 it didn’t matter whether you used the Win2k theme or the Vista/Aero/Win7 theme, performance was good.
Can’t speak to Win8/10.
Yeah.. I take your point with the CNC miller. I’ve had it try to upgrade two machines and brick both. I’m not stupid though and had images of the disk to roll back when win10 failed.
Good on her!!
I don’t think that’s what bricking means. It’s only bricking if it’s completely unrecoverable.
Good on her, for all the good it will actually do. $10,000 is chump change to Microsoft. The ad revenue and telemetry data they take in from Windows 10 probably ads up to double that, at minimum.
For me at least, it’s not about the money, it’s about an individual winning a case against a giant like Microsoft, and it’s big enough that it’s carried in the media. This gets the word out that the individual can fight the machine and win. By dropping their appeal, Microsoft is admitting that they screwed up, and hopefully they will work to fix this issue. Though, with only a month left in the “free upgrade” period, one has to wonder what their game plan is now.
Hi,
For me, it about an individual winning a case against a giant, and setting a precedent that leaves the giant wide open for a massive class action.
– Brendan
The thing is, that we accept that software makers take control over our computers and we cannot prevent.
Just imaging, the night you park you car in the garage and the next day you get four new tires (of course much better and faster then the old ones) on it.
I’d call the police.
Faster, yes. Exceptions prove the rule.
Better, depends on how much you value your privacy and control over what your computer does (like installing updates).
My problem with updates: SW makers don’t really tell us what they have changed. So often that you can read that a smartphone App was great and free and after the next “update” it contains ad-ware. But the manufacturer won’t tell.
There is a solution to that: Free and Open Source software.
Unfortunately, not enough users are sufficiently bothered by the problems which you described to make a difference. Plus they would have to live with a limited selection of apps then.
Maybe because this open source software doesn’t do what we need? It does what the developers need, which makes sense in context, but that doesn’t matter. And no, “learn to program” isn’t practical for 99% of the population who use computers to do a full-time job they already have. If the software doesn’t do what we need, we go somewhere else. Ideology be damned. We’ve got work to do.
darknexus,
While on some level I do appreciate these points you bring up, the thing about your criticism that I find unfair is that it is framed exclusively against open source. However the truth is that it applies to the software industry as a whole.
For example, countless times I’ve found that proprietary products don’t work exactly how I want it to or won’t do exactly what I need. Support by commercial vendors is hit or miss, some of it is downright atrocious. Quite frankly the level of support in the open source community often surpasses that of commercial vendors. Just because you’ve bought a product doesn’t mean they care about your individual needs. I could list several cases where I’ve been disappointed (with open source as well as with proprietary software) but I won’t bother because I expect everyone has had similar experiences already.
So, even though you are right that many people have neither the skill nor the will to work with open source code, it would not be rational for this in and of itself to be considered a ‘con’. For you, the end user, the net effect is that ether way with both proprietary and open source, you won’t personally be able to modify it. Commercial vendors might customize their software to your needs through hassle-free support contracts, but many open source developers are more than happy to offer this as well – some even bend over backwards without any contract.
As for chithanh’s point about exposing what software is doing, I think he’s entirely correct that the advantage goes to open source, even if you don’t otherwise take advantage of it.
and while i give them some plusses on some products, Google are flipping awful for this.
They absolutely banjaxed the productivity of my Android phone typing experience (and accuracy) recently in updating the keyboard.
The swipe typing accuracy was very high, 19 in 20 perfect guesses I would say, and dropped to 15 or less now. And no option to roll back far as I can tell
that’s rubbish.
What would you do if a software update you didn’t authorize to the EFI controller in your car made it run cleaner?
Still throw a fit, because who knows what else it did? It’s as everyone (well, everyone with sense) has said: most people will update if:
1. The update process is easy and,
2. The update brings a clear benefit, as stated, and doesn’t break things the user relies on. And no, “bug fixes” doesn’t count. I want to know what the purpose of any update is before I install it, so that I can judge whether it is likely to cause some sort of problem first.
Let’s use your car example, because for some reason (though I don’t get why) every darned computer discussion falls back on car analogies. Let’s say this unauthorized update makes your car run cleaner. Awesome, right? But let’s say it did this on a car you’ve done some modifications to. That update, which may have made standard setups run cleaner, could cause your car to not perform properly with your modifications (tuned engines, intake upgrades, what have you). If you’ve done all of these things, then who is the best person to know whether an update will be of benefit? Hint: it’s not the manufacturer who doesn’t know what you’ve done.
I can’t stop feeling that people are becoming more and more dumb. Science is making so much progress but all that is unreachable to growing number of people.
Yet that is small problem compared to existence of even dumber “social warriors” fighting war for this mob. Don Quixote style.
Obviously low journalist standards do not allow leaking any technical details about this case. Isn’t it to have people debate about generalized scenario of evil corporations versus good people ?
“We accept so much crap from software makers, so it feels good if someone manages to get back at them for the terrible quality of software in general.”
Oh Thom. How dumb is what you wrote. It’s like saying that it is good that you broke hand while climbing trees. It is for all those broken branches. Social justice warriors…
Edited 2016-06-28 07:13 UTC
People are dumb because they have better things to do than care about the inner workings of their computer?
No. They were only dumb if they assumed that Microsoft would act in user interest instead of their own corporate interest. Many users have woken up to this now.
What Microsoft did was not illegal IMO, but the entrapment and duping users into Windows 10 was not something a respectable company would do.
How sad is it when everything can now be branded as “Social Justice Warriors”.
Here’s a hint: if you use the term to apply to everything, it has NO MEANING. This is the new “PC gone mad” bollocks.
The people worse than the PC police are the anti-PC police, and the same goes for their anti-SJW offspring.
They may have a self-defeating, conflicted, and utterly contradictory ideology but I don’t see what they have to do with this case either.
Agreed. And can you guys stop publishing every single news that writes negative aspects on Windows 10, regardless how dumb sources are?
I mean that b* should get nailed on general principle and pay money to MS as even you published the story. Why is she using PC, or why did her travel agency gave it to her, if she is just dumb? Everything updates. Even Linux. If you don’t know the basics than you should not depend on a PC, or just ask the Administrator.
And then installation failed on her… So what? You can revert it in extreme scenarios of dumb playing dumb, anyway – it’s Windows afterall.
I’m using it and IMHO it’s the best OS I worked on. I even have a Bash shell, which is just minor feature to how far Windows went, and how it bravely tries to synthesize single OS to many different hardware. When will such things come to Linux? Certainly never if Windows doesn’t make paths to follow. And I love Debian/Ubuntu just to mention.
IMHO, OS News should embrace such effords, regarless if it’s from MS
Uh oh, someone’s got an inferiority complex. What’s wrong? Are you annoyed that you didn’t think of it first? Oh, that’s right… you don’t work, do you? You know, that thing where we have to be productive and can’t have our computers just randomly doing shit in the middle of our projects? You’ve heard of it?
Although you seem rude, I do work, as Python developer on custom ERP project in Django. I don’t like ERP but it gives money. I can do all that in Windows even withouth Bash shell, although all local servers work on Ubuntu.
You probably misunderstood me…
Edited 2016-06-28 14:16 UTC
Everything else asks permission first, and doesn’t try to trick the user into updating anyway with a fake close button. Since you mentioned Linux, I have yet to come across a distribution whose default settings are to silently, automatically update even if I tell it not to, much less blatantly lying to me with a false close button that does the opposite of what the user expects. Ditto for Mac OS; Apple has automated a lot of the updating process but it still requires user intervention and informed consent before the update begins.
And that’s really what all this boils down to: Implied consent versus informed consent. Microsoft has made an erroneous assumption that every single Windows user has already agreed to upgrade to Windows 10, and their increasingly malicious efforts to force the upgrade show this. They are incorrectly assuming implied consent on the part of the user. By contrast, other operating systems work from a basis of informed consent, where the user is told what is to be updated, why it is to be updated, and is then given the choice to proceed.
In short, Microsoft took the user out of the decision entirely, most recently by use of misinformation and deception. In any other industry (and in fact, even in this industry) that would be the basis for a fraud investigation.
Windows 10 is a good OS as I stated before (hell, I’m typing this from it), but Microsoft’s tactics to get its users there by force are reprehensible.
I have not experienced that. As in this case we are talking about a firm, they should have probably manage that on their own. As administrator you can always make what you want or dont want in Group Polices, even the upgrade to Windows 10 or whatever (and Administrator should have been aware of MS aggressive push to Windows 10).
I’m just a PC user as you apparently are. Here, on this portal, I’m just surprised on the classification – IMHO Mac OS is so closed and so expensive that it deserves the treatment that Windows gets here, but on contrary we get Mac OS praise. Go figure…
Edited 2016-06-28 15:04 UTC
Things tend to get praised where it’s warranted and slated where that’s warranted. You know that recent versions of MacOS are free as updates too, right?
You do realize that macOS is both free and partially open source, right? Two things that Windows is completely not?
“Implied consent versus informed consent.”
Upgradexit?
I don’t get why it’s so hard for people to understand that what’s being objected to is the unauthorized modification of our systems. Are people so brainwashed as to think Big Brother Bill should dictate what you do?
P.s. I know, Bill’s not in charge up there anymore. But it just has a ring to it.
Edited 2016-06-28 16:43 UTC
About W10 is the new Clean Slate Reinstall. Bye Bye bloatware&troyanware.
*chuckle* Not sure if my Thunderbird’s RSS updates are just crapping out again or if this actually just got posted, but VG Cats seems to have captured the sentiment toward Microsoft’s “marketing” quite well:
http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=377