back to article Microsoft wants screaming Windows fans, not just users

Microsoft's revealed it doesn't just want Windows users, it wants Windows fans. As in queue-all-night, constantly-offer-unsolicited-feedback, faint-at-the-sight-of-pop-stars fans. News of Redmond's ardor comes from a post by Yusuf Mehdi, corporate veep of Microsoft's Windows and Devices Group. Mehdi writes of the attending …

  1. hplasm
    Gimp

    "“Have you ever heard of a Microsoft user group?”"

    Should that not be a Microsoft support group.

    Not techincal support, mind.

    The screaming is normal.

    1. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge
      Coat

      Re: "“Have you ever heard of a Microsoft user group?”"

      Microsoft User Group

      That would be a MUG, yes? Seems apt.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "“Have you ever heard of a Microsoft user group?”"

      So Microsoft wants fans - hmm...

      The word 'fans' is a shortened form of 'fanatics'.

      From Wikipedia: Fanaticism is a belief or behavior involving uncritical zeal or with an obsessive enthusiasm. Philosopher George Santayana defines fanaticism as "redoubling your effort when you have forgotten your aim". The fanatic displays very strict standards and little tolerance for contrary ideas or opinions.

      From Dictionary.com: a person with an extreme and uncritical enthusiasm or zeal, as in religion or politics.

      So yes, I guess I can see why Microsoft wants 'fans'.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    Maybe...

    ...if you stop forcing your vision down people's throats, despite what people say (Windows 10)? Or how about when you produce new hardware (WinRT, Winphone), you don't abandon it 6 months down the road. How about realising not everything has to be cloud?

    I think MS do many things well, but lately their attitude has been utter contempt for their own customers.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Maybe...

      Apart from the obvious problems with updates & spying, etc I think Win 10 could be a good OS if they would just listen to what the users want. If they would just keep the appearance the way it is but put us back in the driving seat then it would make a lot of people smile.

      But MS keep forcing me to use Linux. The OS is irrelevant for my work, Linux and Windows both work perfectly well and have all the tools I need but I need reliability - the OS works for me, not the other way round and when I leave it to do something and walk away I need to know it's still going to be there when I come back a day later, doing what it was told to do.

      Grub is configured to boot Mint by default (deliberately), so when they force a reboot I just use whatever is running. In reality I have had Win 10 since the day it came out and every now and again I give it a chance, but it never seems to last more than 2 days before rebooting back into Mint.

      1. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge

        Re: Rebooting back to Mint?

        Are you sure that it wasn't the result of a .... BSOD?

        Also just wait until a future patch overwrites the boot into grub. MS won't be wanting you to boot into anything else now would they?

        You can't do all their testing for them running Mint now can you?

      2. Updraft102

        Re: Maybe...

        Well, if they put the user back in the driver's seat and left the appearance the way it is... Windows 10 would still fall short. It's ugly, inconsistent, and disjointed, and returning control to the user (while a very good thing) would not fix that.

      3. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Linux

        Re: Maybe...

        "If they would just keep the appearance the way it is"

        NO. Back to 7 or XP or even 2k or the '98 look for me. I *HATE* 2D FLATSO FLUGLY THE METRO!

        "But MS keep forcing me to use Linux"

        ACK on _that_ one.

    2. Doctor Huh?

      Re: Maybe...

      "I think MS do many things well, but lately their attitude has been utter contempt for their own customers."

      Since the conventional wisdom has been to avoid the first 2 releases of any new MS product since the DOS days, and since the MS landscape is littered with abandoned products (Microsoft Bob, anyone? Windows ME?), the only thing I dispute about the statement above is the word "lately."

    3. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Thumb Up

      lately their attitude has been utter contempt for their own customers.

      and that pretty much sums it up!

  3. Dan 55 Silver badge

    Windows makes me scream too

    But not in a good way.

    1. Dazed and Confused
      Flame

      Re: Windows makes me scream too

      Yepp definitely screaming here.

      W10 boxes refuse to print.

      W10 boxes randomly decide not to talk to the fileservers.

      W10 boxes with dual screens randomly move your desktop icons around.

      W10 boxes keep trying to update, keep failing and just keep re downloading all the update again.

      That's before we get onto subjective things like how vile the UI is.

      Oh and I almost forgot, W10 boxes that insist on rebooting while you are in the middle of working on something crucial.

      quality like it's 1990 again.

      When Billy boy launched W2000 the world laughed in his face when he boasted that some of their boxes had been up for 80 days, like that was some sort of achievement and he thought teacher should give him a gold star or something. Well I bet he couldn't manage 80days of up time on W10, it would sabotage his efforts.

      Pull your F*&^ing socks up, this has stopped being funny.

      1. Daniel Hall
        Thumb Down

        Re: Windows makes me scream too

        My Win 10 box with a crappy Q6600 (just showing its age) has been up for just over 4 months now!

        As for the rest of your issues, I can only advise that your PC must be haunted. I come to this conclusion that the tens of users I support privately have NONE of the issues you have described.

        EXCEPT

        That damn forced restart. That is the only truth in your 'story'.

        #mustbeamacfan

        1. Dazed and Confused

          Re: Windows makes me scream too

          > That is the only truth in your 'story'.

          Why would I want to lie to you?

          I've got 3 W10 boxes and my wife has 1.

          Her laptop regularly moves all the desktop icons from the where they should be on the left of her main monitor and dumps them on the right of her laptop screen. It did it again last night, but it does it regularly. This machine updated itself to W10 without asking, it just did it one morning, just before a very important teleconference.

          The laptop I'm writing this on was bought with W10 preinstalled. It won't install the 1607 update but tries every few days. I wish MS would agree to pay for the bandwidth it's eating. It will also not talk to my NAS box yet happy talks to Samba on one of my Linux servers. This is the only one of the W10 boxes which started at W10. The others were updates.

          In my office I have 2 W10 boxes, both were updates. Neither will now print. They keep complaining that that they can't connect to the printers, yet if I point any of the web browsers at the printers they connect quite happily. If you prod the systems enough they complain they don't have the drivers. So I re-install the drivers and they still complain they don't have the drivers. Now I'm not the only person suffering thing problem, try Googling for it and if you're allergic to using Google trying Binging for it lots of people complain of exactly the same problem. The same is true to the problem with the fileserver access. One of these systems had the same problem with the fileserver, I tried setting a share up as a network drive and it now connects OK. On the laptop above the same trick worked once, but after the next update it stopped working.

          > has been up for just over 4 months now! EXCEPT That damn forced restart.

          Oh to sweet irony of it all

          THAT WAS THE WHOLE POINT OF MY COMMENT ABOUT UPTIME!

          It's still unplanned down time if the OS decides to reboot while I'm in the middle of working whether it's a BSOD or whether the OS says I'm going down in 10mins with no option to say PISS OFF I'M BUSY.

          > #mustbeamacfan

          New round here are you?

          The last time I worked on a Mac it was the original one, the one with a BW 9"ish screen.

          I don't give a fly f*&^ what OS I run on a desktop, I just want it to work. I gave up being "interested" in desktop OSs when my old HP-UX workstation's power supply died about 20 years ago.

          I run Linux on servers.

          I do also have Linux latops, but there is a reason I have rather more Windows ones.

          Oh and I currently print from W10 by saving as a PDF file, copying the files to one of my W7 boxes and printing from there. It's quite likely the two W10 boxes in the office will go back to W7 as that seems to work. Apparently I'm not allowed to call going from W10 to W7 an upgrade even if it does improve the functionality and stability.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Windows makes me scream too

            Those issues do indeed exist, I have seen them all in my travels.

            Obviously a 'damn forced restart' is not considered an issue for them - they haven't had to take their 'hard drive box' back to PC World in 4 months so Windows is good enough for them ;)

          2. bombastic bob Silver badge
            Unhappy

            Re: Windows makes me scream too

            "I've got 3 W10 boxes and my wife has 1."

            you have my sympathy, pity, and condolences.

            1. Dazed and Confused

              Re: Windows makes me scream too

              > you have my sympathy, pity, and condolences.

              Thank you for your understanding. I'm trying to find counselling to help me with my condition. But I've not found a cure. I've got an HP85 too, I find that helps.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Windows makes me scream too

          @Danial Hall

          "That is the only truth in your 'story'"

          So because it hasn't happened to you it can't possibly have happened to anyone else?

          1. DJV Silver badge

            @LeeE

            Agree, but you spelt his name wrong - it should be "Denial" ;)

  4. inmypjs Silver badge

    "Windows needs to be able to win fans"

    If you want me to be a fan don't turn the tool that I use to run Windows applications into a steaming pile of uncontrollable spyware shit that thinks it is a phone.

    "that thought in the back of my mind 'How are our fans going to react?'"

    The opinion of a handful of loons who like the crap you have been producing recently is important why?

    Maybe you should have though about the reaction of hundreds of millions which was to reject your Windows 10 crap even while you were trying to ram it down their throats for free.

  5. Hans 1
    Gimp

    Gosh

    Windows fandom ? I really need to head over to Redmond and unplug that reality distortion field generator they cloned from Apple .... it ain't working. I am pretty sure I am counted as a Windows Insider, as well ...

    yours,

    Hans1

    Accenture MHP

    Adobe MHP

    Microsoft MHP

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Windows

    Uhm, right.... suuure.

    "Mehdi says the Windows Insider program now has over ten million participants."

    Quantity doesn't make quality. I mean, there are also thousands (most likely more!) of Windows 10 users out there who would rather get Windows 7 back yet don't know how to do that (sometimes that would be impossible for them, think about laptops with a pre-installed Windows without physical installation media).

    And are you sure that all the users who got forcefully upgraded to Windows 10 didn't automatically become a member of this insider program as well? Because I remember reading those stories about that automatically installed Windows 10 user hub software which could be used to provide 'much required feedback'.

    Most importantly the Insider program, with very low application requirements, is also a sure way to get your hands on previews, aka free software. People looking for freebies don't necessarily meet the criteria for being a fan.

    The fact that Microsoft seems to believe this is only a sign for me that they've become delusional.

    1. AMBxx Silver badge

      aka free software

      It's not free, just early. Those on the Fast ring also find their computers breaking quite frequently. They have to be very keen to go through a fresh install every few months.

      Greater concern is that the Insider Program becomes a Microsoft Echo Chamber - they just listen to the people who consider themselves fans rather than a wider user base. That said, not sure how you reach the wider population - most of them just want to get on with using a computer.

      1. Helldesk Dogsbody

        Re: aka free software

        Every few months? Try a new build every couple of weeks on the slow ring! I run it at home on a non-critical system just so that I can see what's coming up that might break everything I have in place in the office.

        To be fair, while I am definitely not a fan of the telemetry (and that automatic restart banner message needs to be acid etched on a large steel plate then rammed in to the fundamental orifice of i) the person who proposed it and ii) the person who signed off on it. Sideways) there are enough things that are better on a day to day basis that I do see it as being mostly an improvement.

    2. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

      Re: Uhm, right.... suuure.

      Exactly. I signed up as an Insider to get W10 preview builds. Having previewed it I then gave up, but no doubt I'm still listed as a "participant".

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Uhm, right.... suuure.

        Same here, must be over 2 years ago I signed up when trying a beta version that had the shutdown button right at the top of the start menu.

        I was prompted to join the insider programme and I did feed back about the shutdown button, but that was all I did. I hope I am not considered to be one of those millions of participants.

    3. Dwarf

      Re: Uhm, right.... suuure.

      I smell BS. If they were really listening then :

      1. You would remember that its OUR computer, not YOURS

      2. We would have a working start menu, like the one that worked on Win7, where we can organise it how it works best for us, the user.

      3. We would not be force fed patches and updates all bundled where we can't remove the problematic ones whilst you sort them out nor have to suffer the random reboots when the installs happen. Uptime matters on our machines as we have them connected to other things that matter too.

      4. We would not have our settings forgotten when Windows re-installs the next beta.

      5. It would get a good reputation and you wouldn't need to try and ram it down people's throats with the malware tactics to get it installed. We decide if we like something, not you.

      6. You would realise that most of us don't care about your cloudy thing that's always suffering some major outage but you try to force that on us too.

      7. They would realise that a forced Microsoft logon is not wanted by most people, so stop trying to penalise us when we choose not to use your latest idea. Last I checked you couldn't submit insider feedback without being Win10 and using the MS logins etc - so you get a distorted view from the start.

      8. They would stop moving everything around in the UI each time a minor update comes out.

      9. They would test it internally before releasing it - most of us have real work to do and we are not a free QA department. If you want QA, then you pay for it. I can be hired for testing, my hourly rate is $150.

      10. They would have dropped all the advertising, telemetry and re-installing crapware apps that people detest

      As they have shown a complete lack of understanding on customer needs, that's whats resulted in many of us closing the windows and moving to Linux or devices based on other OS's.

      1. Pompous Git Silver badge

        Re: Uhm, right.... suuure.

        "As they have shown a complete lack of understanding on customer needs, that's whats resulted in many of us closing the windows and moving to Linux or devices based on other OS's."
        Wish I could upvote that more...

  7. tony2heads

    Wrong picture

    If I think of screaming windows users, the image I get is like the picture by Edvard Munch

    1. BongoJoe
      Headmaster

      Re: Wrong picture

      From what I understand having visited the Munch museum on a regular occasion (I used to live a stone's throw away from it) the Scream is not of someone who is a tortured soul but one expressing joy.

      Munch, however, was a tortured soul and was loopy as a fruitbat.

  8. conscience
    Coffee/keyboard

    MS must be joking

    Isn't MS asking for love a bit like a struck-off dentist starting a tooth pulling fan club?

    What's to love? Their crap software that's badly designed, full of bugs and steals your data? Best I can do is vague amusement at the circus that is MS' repeated bad decisions and a laugh at how disconnected this VP actually is.

    Icon: Because El Reg owe me half a cup of tea besides the new keyboard.

  9. TrumpSlurp the Troll
    Angel

    Come on guys think positive

    There are the first signs that Microsoft are beginning to listen to users.

    Forced unscheduled updates are being eased up on.

    Who knows, in time you may even be able to limit the telemetry.

    If you want to influence Microsoft you probably have a better chance joining the insider programme than ranting here.

    Disclaimer: nothing more recent than W8.1 and no, I haven't joined the insider programme.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Come on guys think positive

      There are the first signs that Microsoft are beginning to listen to users.

      Yup. In the same way that Trump listens to voters.

      I have no idea what these guys snort for breakfast, but it is probably as white as Ubers management. If Microsoft wants "fans", it first has to cross the gulf between where they are now and a company with a product that sells itself rather than by coercion, market abuse and flat out ignoring user's rights.

      Consider that position a starting point, not where they are now.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      'If you want to influence MS you probably have a better chance joining the insider programme'

      That only works if you believe they'll listen, but since M$ is a cult they won't. Instead we need to pressure shoppers who go into stores to demand Linux or just walk out.

      1. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Linux

        Re: 'If you want to influence MS you probably have a better chance joining the insider programme'

        "That only works if you believe they'll listen"

        ACK. they don't.

        FYI I tried to influence Win-10-nic early on by joining the insider program months before Win-10-nic hit the shelves. The end result is that I was threatened with a ban (along with MANY others who were equally vocal and many were banned from the insider forum), not for "TOU" violations (which I was careful to avoid), but (apparently) they were JUST tired of me pointing out all of the flaws, repeatedly, and with great "enthusiasm" (in order to get them FIXED) and looking for an excuse to GET RID OF ME. You know, things like going into detail about the spying and adware, the _FACT_ that 3D appearance is preferred 2:1 over 2D FLATSO, the FACT that "the Metro" Settings just LOOKS BAD and adds confusion to configuring the system, that the uber-thin window borders and default light blue on bright white is HARD! TO! READ! for OLD! EYES! [making it an "assistive technology" issue, right off the bat], yotta yotta yotta.

        I was "pooping their party" with simple things like THE TRUTH.

        But, obviously (now) THAT EFFORT was just "spitting into the wind" because Micro-shaft *ONLY* listens to the fanbois any more! And, they seek to SHUT UP and BAN everyone else. It's obvious, because they _DID_ _JUST_ _THAT_ !!!

        "Instead we need to pressure shoppers who go into stores to demand Linux or just walk out."

        Well, that is unfortunately NOT the right tactic, though I don't DISagree with you.

        The right tactic, unfortunately, would cost a lot of money. It would involve a MARKETING CAMPAIGN for desktop Linux, along with software vendors of major products that are willing to produce LINUX VERSIONS so people can still use their favorite software on the new Linux machines. [in the case of Intuit products, I think they're already using JAVA so it would be somewhat simple, you'd think...]

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Come on guys think positive

      "There are the first signs that Microsoft are beginning to listen to users."

      They've been saying they are listening to user feedback since the preview versions, why would you believe them now?

      Highly unlikely, but if they did really listen to users then within a week we would have an OS that looked exactly like Win 7, did not have any telemetry (or at least it was optional and not enabled by default), the update process had the same flexibility as Win 7, and we knew what we were getting in the updates.

      The day I can go back to my PC and it's exactly as I left it, and I don't have to go through the privacy settings and make sure services are still disabled, I might start to trust them again.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Come on guys think positive

      "Forced unscheduled updates are being eased up on"

      Wrong. Before you could stop them installing by saying you are on a metered connection.

      They have now removed that option. It now will allow you to delay, but not stop updates.

    5. Ilsa Loving

      Re: Come on guys think positive

      > TrumpSlurp the Troll

      >Come on guys think positive

      You've certainly lived up to your username!

  10. Sgt_Oddball
    Childcatcher

    2 pence worth

    I think they're looking for that same zeal that Mac users have but they seem to be missing the point. An OS is a tool. It is not meant to be loved worshipped and adored, it's just meant to work nothing more and certainly nothing less.

    And as for Bieber...no just no

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Wrong insider program

    Cranial invasion of the rectal cavity: this is not the insider program you're looking for..

    (with apologies to Star Wars)

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    Here's my feedback to Microsoft

    Just fuck off.

    1. psychonaut

      Re: Here's my feedback to Microsoft

      simple, yet effective

      1. Neil Barnes Silver badge

        Re: Here's my feedback to Microsoft

        Um, apparently not effective - MS is still here.

        1. VinceH
          Coat

          Re: Here's my feedback to Microsoft

          Give it a chance - he only said it six hours ago!

  13. 0laf
    Flame

    Forced upgrades

    Fucked updates

    Adverts on a paid for platform

    Withdrawal of services at short notice

    Lack of support on their own platforms

    Any excuse to ramp prices

    Yeah we're all fucking fans of that MS we're fucking just loving it.

  14. psychonaut

    i am a fan

    of win 7.

  15. hplasm
    Coat

    I though they didn't want screaming fans?

    http://forums.windowscentral.com/windows-10/372695-laptops-fan-running-full-speed-since-windows-10-update.html

    1. Detective Emil

      Re: I thought they didn't want screaming fans?

      See also Three things I miss after ditching my MacBook.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Fans are your best customers...

    ... they are truly uncritical. They swallow whatever you push down their throats. When you have mostly crappy products, it's important to cultivate a fan base.

    1. Updraft102

      Re: Fans are your best customers...

      "Fans are your best customers...

      ... they are truly uncritical. They swallow whatever you push down their throats. When you have mostly crappy products, it's important to cultivate a fan base."

      And that's the point of the Insider program, isn't it? They've already purged the forum of dissenting voices, so it's already an echo chamber of "fans." Whatever Microsoft does, they're a fan; they can find a way to justify anything MS does to maintain their self-delusion regarding Microsoft's greatness. That, of course, was no accident-- it was the point of the whole thing.

      By cultivating this garden of slobbering sycophants while pretending that it's a representation of the Windows using public, MS gets a shield against any criticism that may come their way. Every time people begin to complain about the latest abuse from MS, all MS has to do is claim that they've gotten positive feedback on the changes from their insiders, so it looks like you complainers are just haters or fans of some other OS trying to tear down Windows... a vocal minority that can and should be ignored. Any of you Windows users out there who were thinking of complaining: You would not want to be on the side of haters, do you? If you don't like where Windows is going, you must be wrong; after all, the Insiders like it, and they're just like you, but smarter.

      The Windows Insider program wasn't meant to make sure Windows is developed according to the needs of its users. In a spectacular bit of irony, it's meant to shield Microsoft from the pressure to develop Windows according to the needs of the users, while maintaining the illusion that they're doing just that.

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Yawn!

    It's getting like a football phone-in programme around here.

    Name calling. My side's better than yours. Our manager is a pile of shite. OFFS what have they done now?!?

    Yes, even operating systems have fans.

    1. hplasm
      Coat

      Re: Yawn!

      "Yes, even operating systems have fans."

      So why does W10 want some?

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Yup. In the same way that ...

    Trump listens to voters. I have no idea what these guys snort for breakfast, but it is probably as white as Ubers management.

    that reads like poetry

  19. Zmodem

    show me the money, bored of beta testing for free and finding all the main bugs , then all the tard youtubers get everything for free

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hmm...

    "Mehdi writes of the attending the launch of Xbox One and seeing fans queue in the streets"

    The Xbox one launch disaster? Were there really fans queued in the streets? I think not. I think this must be a dream he had. If there were queues, then it's queues of laid stooges lined up pretending to be fans, for the sake of the brain-dead media that's were too stupid to see through launch marketing stunts. (I was paid to pretend to be a xbox360 launch night customer, the vast majority of other people in the big city launches were stooges too)

    1. Planty Bronze badge
      Megaphone

      Re: Hmm...

      Ahh, I see what he did there, he didn't say they were queuing in the streets for an Xbox One, he just attended the launch, and saw them queuing in the streets for a PS4!!!!

      As always with Microsoft, you need to read between the lines to understand the real story....

  21. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Don't know about fans, but if Microsoft want Screaming Enemies they've got them now too

    - Long standing MS dev here. As a consultant I helped generate millions of sales of Microsoft products. But that all ended with Windows-10.

    - I draw the line at OS spying or where telemetry crosses the creepy line. Now, I actively denigrate MS and promote FOSS / Linux instead.

    - I also refuse to help marooned users on windows forums any more, never did that before. Anyway good luck with the new direction Microsoft!

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Never had an issue...

    .. with Microsoft products - especially Windows 10. Looking at the OS from a home user perspective, I'm not sure what people have issues with? I think the UI is perfectly acceptable and quite intuitive, with a few areas that could use improvement - the two different 'Add/Remove Program' windows maybe? I think Microsoft have a chance of building a fan base with their new Surface range. Owning a Surface Pro 3 myself, I couldn't recommend it highly enough. The whole telemetry thing is nothing new and certainly not limited to Windows 10 or even Microsoft products - who the hell is deluded enough to believe that? Microsoft seems stuck with those who resist change, where as the likes of Apple have an army of fans who embrace it.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Never had an issue...

      Really !

      Why has my CPU use gone through the roof and my traffic slowed to a trickle ?

      Oh right another uncommanded huge update download and install.

    2. Tom 7

      Re: Never had an issue...

      I have a couple of holiday cottages where we provide internet for the guests. I can tell when guests with W10 laptops have arrived - my youngest appears from her cave and complains the internet is broken.

      1. nijam Silver badge

        Re: Never had an issue...

        > I can tell when guests with W10 laptops have arrived ...

        Either throttle guest wifi or (better) blacklist microsoft sites at the router.

        1. hplasm
          Devil

          Re: Never had an issue...

          "blacklist microsoft sites at the router."

          Advice for life.

    3. Roland6 Silver badge

      Re: Never had an issue...

      I think Microsoft have a chance of building a fan base with their new Surface range.

      I think there are many, including Yusuf Mehdi who have forgotten their history...

      MS had a fan base, that supported it through the 1980's, 1990's and 2000's, only MS decided having a fan base was so yesterday, so set about doing everything possible to turn it's fans away with release of Vista, 8 and 10 and being so daft about XP/2003 end of life (the platforms that really got MS established in the Enterprise) and the forced OS upgrades associated with 8 & 10.

      The problem MS has today, is that it's fans are starting to wise up, back in the 1990's and 2000's people were more prepared to give MS the benefit of the doubt when things went wrong (eg. Millenium, XP prior to SP2 and to some extent Vista). Also as the industry has moved on, it's products (specifically Windows and Office) are no longer at the leading edge of technology adoption, they have become platform. Even Xbox is just a platform, my son uses the Xbox to play Call of Duty, he doesn't care that it's a Microsoft Xbox, just it runs the games he wants to play.

    4. Updraft102

      Re: Never had an issue...

      The Apple fans would resist change if Apple was not giving them any. If Apple gives them change, they embrace it. They embrace everything Apple does. That's why they're fans, and why we PC folks make fun of their unthinking devotion and lack of critical thinking skills.

    5. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Gimp

      Re: Never had an issue...

      you forgot the icon (I'll do it for ya, heh heh heh)

    6. FozzyBear
      Coffee/keyboard

      Re: Never had an issue...

      Never had an issue...

      Whilst the device was turned off.

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The only thing happening with Windows and fans is the shit hitting it.

  24. naive

    MS is not that bad

    Having market share of 90% and more on the desktop leaves its marks. They are used to selling licenses to the mega corps by the billions, together with boat loads of windows server revenues.

    The consumer was always a by catch, an entity who did not have much choice anyway, since the combined marketing power of Wintel and the likes of Dell, HP, Toshiba ASUS and others who were selling PC's with the obligatory Windows tax unchallenged for decades.

    Now the consumer has a choice in how to access the internet, MS realizes it has to work to win the hearts and minds of non corporate entities in order not to lose this by catch. Maybe they will improve, and try to bring fun and easy to use products, instead of giving users this voodoo experience when using their user interfaces. It will be interesting if they manage to descend from their throne in order to find out what the commons think, and translate this into products which are fun to use.

    1. Updraft102

      Re: MS is not that bad

      I think a more reasonable explanation is that MS has assumed the loss of the home users is already written, so they have a limited time to liquidate the remaining value of that asset before it goes away... use it or lose it, in other words.

      Nothing MS has done suggests any desire to remain in the non-enterprise general purpose operating system business. Home users have been besieged with adware for Windows 10, subjected to Microsoft-recommended OS upgrades that any PC tech worth the description would have advised against (and rendering thousands of formerly operable PCs unbootable), plied with ads, subjected to unwanted app installs, and used as unpaid, involuntary beta testers so MS could save money by firing the paid QA department (this includes both the forced updates and the forced spying).

      There's nothing anywhere that suggests the home users are in any way valued customers. They're nothing more than a rapidly-depreciating asset that MS is desperately trying to use up before it ceases to have any value at all. They know they can't keep abusing their home customers forever and have them remain as customers. That doesn't mean much if they are already convinced the home market is going to go away no matter what they do.

      If this scenario I described above turns out to be true, MS will continue to ratchet up the abuse on its remaining home customers as time passes, since the goal is to eventually alienate them all so they can finally close the book on home Windows.

      The recent half-measures we've seen from MS (the ability to defer updates and set wired connections to metered in Insider editions) don't in themselves contradict this; these appear to be measures to address the Win 10 adoption-rate logjam, not a return to the old paradigm. Even the "use it or lose it" scenario depends on Windows 10 becoming the dominant type of Windows, and we'd be well-advised to avoid mistaking measures to trick people into getting on the Windows 10 failboat for a change in direction..

      If MS decides they would like to keep those customers, we should see a clear about-face and a return to the direction Windows 7 was taking; after all, it could scarcely be clearer what people want in an OS, and what they find lacking in Windows 10. The user feedback data is all over the web, far and wide, and I have not a bit of doubt that MS knows this perfectly well (and that the Insider program is an echo chamber of MS sycophants who would cheer anything MS decided to do).

      I know which of these two I'd bet on.

  25. Admiral Grace Hopper

    Screaming Windows Fans

    The fans stopped screaming on the SQL Server 6 box after we moved from Win NT4 to Win 2K.

  26. F0ul

    Isn't MSDN a Microsoft User Group?

    I am liking Microsoft more and more - having been a huge M$ hater in the days of Win 95 when I discovered Linux etc.

    These days its Microsoft who are doing the interesting things with Server 2016 and Powershell etc

    where they are adding ease of use to concepts that used to be the reasons you'd have to use FOSS

    Having people loving your desktop is so 20th century - we are now almost totally virtual, and M$ is getting good enough that I want to tell my friends about it - and that is how fans are made!

    1. hplasm
      Gimp

      Re: Isn't MSDN a Microsoft User Group?

      Er... you dropped this --->

  27. Aladdin Sane

    I have a Win10 laptop

    It was cheap, it works, and it's better than 8 and Vista.

    1. nijam Silver badge

      Re: I have a Win10 laptop

      Not exactly setting a high bar there, I fear.

      1. Aladdin Sane

        Re: I have a Win10 laptop

        For your average consumer, that's all that matters.

      2. Updraft102

        Re: I have a Win10 laptop

        Actually, I'd take 8 or Vista over 10.

        Vista is very much like Windows 7, which is held by many as the high water mark of Microsoft operating systems. It had a rough start, but it has for years been a very stable and usable product. If you like 7, there is not much to dislike about Vista anymore, and there hasn't been for years.

        Windows 8 (including 8.1) doesn't have non-removable telemetry you can't turn all the way off, Cortana, updates you can't control, apps that get installed even if you don't want them, and it doesn't take it upon itself to change your settings back to those that serve Microsoft whenever it feels like it. Win 8 does not remove programs by itself, and it doesn't remove the driver you carefully selected and replace it with some crappy thing it found in the Windows Update repository one day. It also does not have ads; I understand that MS briefly tried some ads in it a while back, but that was before I'd tried it.

        Windows 8 comes infected by apps and an identity crisis like 10 does. Neither one of them knows whether it is a PC or a phone... but 8 can be helped to understand it's (on) a PC much easier than can 10. Since the "app" mode and the "desktop" mode are separate in 8, it's a lot easier to wall off or rip out the Metro stuff and live completely in the desktop (and without harming the stability of the system). I've done this with both of my main PCs; both are running Windows 8.1 now (dual boot with Mint), and apps are nowhere to be seen. They're gone, including the Windows Store, and they've remained that way since I tore them out in the first place (updates don't put them back). Even with that done, it's perfectly stable; I quite literally could not ask for better.

        Classic Shell (which includes Classic Start) brings back a usable start menu (I haven't found 10's tiled start menu to be any better than the Win 8 start screen) and dispatches the Charms bar, while Old New Explorer removes the ribbon and "folders on this PC" and restores the old Windows 7 UI to File Explorer. There are others (I find 7+ Taskbar Tweaker to be indispensable, with 7 as well as 8.1 or 10), but those listed above do the heavy lifting of making Windows 8 decent to use (along with the custom theme of your choice).

        You might say that it should not be necessary to use aftermarket programs just to have a decent UI, and you'd be right-- but even the vaunted Windows 7 UI has flaws that I need Classic Shell and other such programs to fix. If I HAD to use Windows without aftermarket UI mods, 7 would certainly be more usable than 8 or 8.1, but I don't have to do that.

        The last Windows version that had a UI that was usable (IMO) with only registry changes and not aftermarket programs was XP; ever since then, each successive version of Windows has needed more and more aftermarket intervention to get things straightened out. In Windows 10, it's no longer practical to even try; it takes too much work to do to have it all re-engineered and restored every time a new update comes along. Additionally, a lot of the "app" looking stuff can't be eradicated anymore, as there are no longer Win32 versions of a lot of things. There's no rhyme or reason; it looks like MS simply sprinkled UWP dialogs into the OS at random.

    2. Triggerfish

      Re: I have a Win10 laptop

      probably beats Win ME as well.

      1. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Devil

        Re: I have a Win10 laptop

        naw, ME is better than 10. It's not 2D FLATSO FLUGLY and lets you change colors, etc. and doesn't have the Metro 'Settings' nor "the Start Thing" nor the SPYWARE nor the ADWARE...

        and I think it consumes LESS CPU to do simple things like render to the screen.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I have a Win10 laptop

      Better than Windows 8 isn't a very hard thing to achieve. Better than Windows 7? Of course it's not.

  28. david_kral@hotmail.com

    Like with Windows Mobile fans ...

    Just try to look at http://www.windowscentral.com/does-microsoft-care-about-windows-phone-fans

  29. TRT Silver badge
    Flame

    Screaming fans?

    Have they visited our server room recently?

  30. kend1
    Big Brother

    what goes around ...

    When SkyNet comes online, their first strike will be Redmond. As payback for all the suffering inflicted upon millions of computers. -Fanboi

  31. Kapudan-i Derya

    Microsoft has a tendency to make non-tablet Windows user's(who are probably more than 90% ) life harder. Sometimes without any thinkable reason or request from users it makes changes to many already working things just making it harder and time consuming for non-touch PC users. Then they don't want to listen to user's request to undo that unless it is a big-feature change causing mass public outrage. After tolerating all these they'll then non-stop spy on everything.

    Not a fan.

  32. Geoff Campbell Silver badge
    Gimp

    I rather like Windows 10.

    I also think that Microsoft are the only company showing real innovation in the OS market currently.

    Yeah, I know. Your downvotes fall upon me like gentle rain, and with just as much long-term effect on my views.

    But before you downvote this post, ask yourself just why you care enough to do so? What are you trying to demonstrate?

    GJC

    1. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
      Linux

      Re: I rather like Windows 10.

      I'll upvote you because you're right

      However (and theres always a however)

      M$ are going about it in completely the wrong way, We have a product we make and its been made for years, every so often we tinker with the production process and improve it somewhat and reduce the time it takes to make it. if we followed the m$ system for innovation , we'd delete all the machine programs, throw all the fixturing in the bin and wipe the robots to start from a blank sheet. then spend 12 months trying to make it work again while the customer screamed at us.

      You tell me whats the better method?

      And it does seem m$ are listening......(mutters darkly about forced updates now getting a time to install/reboot instead of killing your PC for 2hrs)

      But its too late

      Linux mint here... and windows only for the CAM program we use until they release a linux version....

    2. Updraft102

      Re: I rather like Windows 10.

      I take it from your avatar that you're something of a masochist, which explains liking Windows 10. To each his own, of course, but just be aware that some of us don't like regular beatings.

      I really wish MS would stop "innovating." We don't need any new and innovative ways to make computer use more annoying, frustrating, inconsistent, or counter-intuitive. I suppose having a software company show this level of malevolence and contempt for their own customers is something of an innovation, but that doesn't make it a good thing. I kind of liked the old way, where the manufacturer of a product would find out what the customers want, then try to give that to them. This "innovative" new idea of producing a terrible product that serves Microsoft's needs instead of those of the user, then trying to force people to take it, is not an improvement. It's also not all that innovative, since it's been the standard way of doing things for monopolists for centuries.

    3. Geoff Campbell Silver badge
      Holmes

      Re: I rather like Windows 10.

      To expand:

      I like Windows 10 for the only reason anyone should ever like an OS - it meets my needs, with the minimum of drama. In combination with Office 365, it does everything I need in terms of basic IT across all platforms, and causes me no pain at all in doing so. More advanced needs require additional applications, all of which run on Windows 10 or the Server equivalents, also with no drama.

      Telling me that I must be a masochist because of those choices is rather pre-supposing a whole bunch of things, and is not useful to the debate in any way. Most importantly, it pre-supposes that I'm too bloody stupid to have looked at the alternatives and evaluated them for my own requirements, which is frankly rather insulting.

      Choose your own OS, and your own applications, for your own requirements. And then extend the same courtesy to others. Simple, really, isn't it?

      GJC

      1. Pompous Git Silver badge

        Re: I rather like Windows 10.

        "More advanced needs require additional applications, all of which run on Windows 10 or the Server equivalents, also with no drama."
        Oh really? How about wanting to still watch television? W10 removed Windows Media Centre and the application that came with the capture card won't work on w10. How about my mate's advanced need for his sign-cutter to work? That won't work on w10.

        "Choose your own OS, and your own applications, for your own requirements. And then extend the same courtesy to others."
        MS forcing w10 on users, using up precious bandwidth without permission, is allowing the user choice? What drugs are you on?

        1. Geoff Campbell Silver badge
          Pint

          Re: I rather like Windows 10.

          Media Centre does still run on Windows 10 (as I understand it, I've not tried it yet), although official support has been dropped. I'm still making up my mind as to whether to rebuild my Media Centre box on Windows 10 with the unofficial installation, or to drop broadcast TV and rebuild the box purely for Internet TV and local media, something I've been toying with for a long time. In the mean time, the box continues to run Media Centre and Windows 8.1 with full support from Microsoft. No drama.

          I cannot speak for your friend's sign cutter. Perhaps he needs to talk to the supplier?

          Drugs - a whole cocktail, some medical, some just for fun. You?

          I really don't understand the anger this subject raises. It's just an operating system, dude!

          GJC

          1. Pompous Git Silver badge

            Re: I rather like Windows 10.

            "Media Centre does still run on Windows 10"
            No, it doesn't. MS removed WMC from w10. There is a hacked version you can DL that will run on w10, but I somehow don't think that would meet with MS's approval. And there couldn't possibly be any danger in DLing a hacked component from the Interwebs now could there?

            "I cannot speak for your friend's sign cutter. Perhaps he needs to talk to the supplier?"
            WTF's that going to achieve? My transparency scanner (Canon FS2710) was purchased back in the days of w2k. When I upgraded to wxp, Canon ignored requests for help to get the scanner running. I solved the issue, but never succeeded with w7. Do you really think my friend talking to the supplier of his hardware is an adequate substitute for cutting signs for his clients? Many hardware sellers much prefer you to go to another manufacturer for a replacement device than purchase your loyalty with updated drivers for new OSs.

            Drugs likewise, so we have something in common ;-)

            "I really don't understand the anger this subject raises. It's just an operating system, dude!"

            I don't think I am angry. Back when MS started the GWX fiasco I was. All of my Internet bandwidth used up downloading redundant copies of w10. But that was what led me to try Cinnamon Mint and the joys of a really first class OS. Being told we should get with it and just suck up problems such as I had doesn't make any sense whatsoever.

            My problem with w10 on the one machine I installed it was being nagged every few minutes with the message "You appear to have a graphics problem". A friend with the same adapter (HD7700 series) DL'd a working driver from AMD only to have it replaced with the original buggy driver by MS update. An OS that forces replacement of working parts with non-working parts is pretty useless to me.

            I did contemplate at the time replacing the video adapter, but when I went looking for the HCL on MS's website, there wasn't one. What was I supposed to do? Buy video adapters at random and hope for the best?

            No, w10 is not just an OS. It's MS saying: Your Internet bandwidth and computer are belong to us. Well I say fuck 'em. No they don't.

            FWIW since you're new around here, I was a MS Certified Solution Provider back in the 90s before I retired.

            1. Geoff Campbell Silver badge
              Pint

              Re: I rather like Windows 10.

              New? Bless you and your short eyesight...

              Thing is, Windows 10 *is* just an OS, and still people are getting angry about it. You don't like it, that's fine, select something else that you do like. Problem solved, move on...

              Going back to your friend's sign cutter as an excellent example, why do they have to run Windows 10 on that machine, right now? There are plenty of other options, including currently-supported versions of Windows, that they could run. My point about talking to the supplier is about the correct aiming of ire - if their drivers don't work on Windows 10, that is down to them to fix, not Microsoft.

              Anyway, I think that'll do for now. I do so enjoy acting as a lightning conductor for mis-placed anti-Microsoft rants, but I can only keep up the conversation for so long.

              GJC

              1. Pompous Git Silver badge

                Re: I rather like Windows 10.

                "Going back to your friend's sign cutter as an excellent example, why do they have to run Windows 10 on that machine, right now?"
                They didn't want to and that's the point. MS did its level best to force the upgrade. In my case, they pushed three copies onto my computers using up all my Internet bandwidth. Why would I need 3 additional copies of an OS that was neither wanted nor needed?

                "My point about talking to the supplier is about the correct aiming of ire - if their drivers don't work on Windows 10, that is down to them to fix, not Microsoft."
                The video driver supplied by MS didn't work on my machine. The same happened to a colleague. He replaced it with a driver from the manufacturer that did work. The very next update from MS replaced the working video driver with the one they supply that doesn't work. What is it you don't understand about this? I'm not anti-MS, far from it, or at least anti-windows. Most of the software I run is Windows software. What I'm anti is my computing being forcibly disrupted by MS because they don't approve of my running W7.

                1. Geoff Campbell Silver badge

                  Re: I rather like Windows 10.

                  "What is it you don't understand about this?"

                  ...and there it is, right there.

                  I understand perfectly fine. Remember where we came in? I said "I rather like Windows 10" and predicted that this wouldn't be a popular viewpoint.

                  I did not, at any point, claim that Windows 10 would suit all needs, or that it was the perfect incarnation of a completely fault-free OS - because such a thing has never existed, in all the 35 years or so I've been working in this wonderful industry of ours.

                  But because it's Windows 10, my simple statement that I rather like it, and that it meets my needs perfectly, brings down the wrath of, well, pretty much everyone.

                  Fortunately, I'm a big boy now, so I can contain my disappointment. But perhaps a little introspection as to what you are arguing against might be in order?

                  GJC

                  1. Pompous Git Silver badge

                    Re: I rather like Windows 10.

                    "I did not, at any point, claim that Windows 10 would suit all needs, or that it was the perfect incarnation of a completely fault-free OS - because such a thing has never existed, in all the 35 years or so I've been working in this wonderful industry of ours."
                    But you did claim it was "just an OS" which is manifestly untrue. No other OS I have run has deliberately used up all of my Internet bandwidth to no useful purpose, or replaced working bits with non-working bits. Not one and I've run an awful lot of different OSs over the decades.

                    1. Geoff Campbell Silver badge

                      Re: I rather like Windows 10.

                      <shrug>

                      It is just an OS. You don't like it, choose a different OS. Since when has that been some great revelation? Choose the solutions that work for you, in a way you like. If a supplier takes decisions you don't like, don't buy their products.

                      Right, I'm out of here. I have better things to be doing with my time, or at least things to do for people who are nagging me more than this thread.

                      GJC

    4. Triggerfish

      Re: I rather like Windows 10.

      1. It tries to steal my data and sell it on.

      2. It adds in adds disguised as handy apps for things like X box live and win phone.

      3. It greys out the fucken option to remove these so you have to do it through powershell.

      4. It forces down updates whether I want them or not or whether they are stable or not, currently my win 10 occasionally just discoonects itself from the network and needs a reboot, the only reason i can surmise for it doing this is; shits and giggles.

      5. The forced updates deliberately remove all these changes I made to stop the bullshit above.

      6. MS seems to think my laptop is now their laptop.

      7. People who know nowt about computers keep phoning me post unwitting upgrade and saying things like this has fucked up my laptop (including trashing an SSD) and I have to deal with it.

      They enough reasons?

      As for innovation. Innovation does not equal good, total shite can be brand new to us as well.

  33. Bladeforce

    Hmm

    I do f8nd it rather amusing the endless circle Windows users are trapped in...moan moan moan

  34. mstreet

    Show of hands

    How many of you out there signed up for the "insiders program" to check out Win10, decided it was crap, and then never bothered to opt out after you decided against it.

    I know I did, and a quick poll of my colleagues shows 80% of them are in the same boat.

    In other words, how many of those 10M insiders are actually active?

  35. karlkarl Silver badge

    Remove the DRM and the cloud / spying nonsense, heck, they don't even need to release the source. Then I would be a fan :)

  36. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    How about first

    They try to get people to not dislike it so much. Then maybe they can worry about getting fans.

    I think that Windows 95's launch will always remain the high watermark for Windows fandom...

  37. Rattus Rattus

    Apart from the obvious "give us back control" that everyone has been saying, as well as "make it not so damn ugly", I'll add "stop pretending everything is happening on a mobile device". Give us an actual desktop OS, the desktop and mobile use cases are just too damn different for this one-size-doesn't-quite-fit-all.

    1. Geoff Campbell Silver badge

      Huh?

      It's a great desktop OS. What're your problems with it on a desktop PC?

      GJC

    2. Updraft102

      I've never been a fan of Apple, as you can see if you look back to one of my earlier posts in this thread. From the Apple II days to the Mac vs PC days to the iOS days, Apple has always been on the wrong side from my perspective, and its smug fanatics are just mint frosting on the proverbial cellular peptide cake.

      Even so, I have to credit Apple for what it has accomplished. It has managed to make a pile of money and inspire a new generation of fans even as its market share shrinks in the mobile market-- and making money is the goal. They've staked out the segment of the market that wants to use technology without having to think about it, and they've stuck to it. They've done this with an unflinching focus on simplicity and intuitiveness, while promoting a level of UI polish that no one else has matched. They have not always gotten every detail right; there are some strong criticisms of the latest Apple UIs that I think are right on the money, but the goal has always been to deliver UI excellence.

      If there was any possibility of providing UI excellence in one OS that would work on iPads and Macs, they most certainly would have done it. A lot of people who conflate Microsoft's latest madness with innovation have been asking when and if Apple was going to start offering touchscreen Macs or a version of MacOS (formerly OSX) that is touch-enabled. The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, isn't it? They don't know how lucky they are to have an OS provider that still thinks a desktop is a desktop and a mobile is a mobile.

      The Windows 10 UI would never pass Apple's standards as it is. The unkempt mixture of native desktop UI and mobile UI, with switches in context from one to another happening repeatedly and with no visible rhyme or reason, would never fly there. What MS has offered as a ready for prime time, finished UI in 10 wouldn't even pass the planning stages at Apple; they simply do not tolerate such jarring inconsistency.

      Apple CEO Tim Cook had it right when he said there were no plans to converge the iPad and the Mac. He said that invariably, this would lead to compromises that would lead to one or both platforms having a user experience that was not as good as it could be. I don't think he said that in a spontaneous, off-the-cuff kind of way... I would presume that Apple had already investigated the idea thoroughly, only to find it wanting. It's no secret, after all, that anything "universal" tends to be really crappy compared to products custom fit to the application or platform for which it is intended. Put another way, a Jack of all trades is master of none.

      That, I think, is why Apple has not gone near this convergence thing. I don't think they've lost their mojo or the innovative spark-- I think they've got a certain standard for what they offer, one that people are willing to pay a hefty premium for, and they're not going to compromise on it. They haven't offered the converged "innovation" because it can't be done well.

      The amount of work that would have to be done to make it seem like it was done well (on the surface at least, no pun intended) would amount to nothing more than developing two separate and feature-complete OSes, then bundling them together and calling it one product. While it would be perhaps the world's best example of putting the cart before the horse, at least then it would be optimized for MacOS with the keyboard/touchpad docked and for iOS with the keyboard undocked.

      Even then, it would result in a notable inconsistency between those two modes... the moment the user snapped the keyboard on or off, the entire user interface would change. At least then it would only happen when the user intentionally initiates such a change in context, as opposed to how Microsoft did it in Windows 10, where the context changes at random and for no reason even on desktops that don't even have a touch mode.

      I don't think Apple would accept even that relatively minor level of jarring inconsistency in a single product. That's not the Apple way. Personally, as a Windows user, I'd welcome it as a huge improvement over 10; since my devices are dedicated PCs without touch, having the complete desktop UI when not in tablet mode (aka "all the time") would mean once again having a UI dedicated, without compromise, to the platform I'm using, without me ever having to deal with the mobile UI. Let the purchasers of 2 in 1s worry about whether they can accept the UI paradigm shift when docked or undocked; I don't plan to be one of them, so it's of no concern to me.

      Ultimately, Apple's position is that rather than having a Mac whose screen can detach and become an iPad, it would be better for the user to have a Mac and an Ipad separately. While being able to jettison the keyboard and go tablet is "gee whiz" cool, it's not all that practical, and it can't be done within Apple's UI standards (and that's not even taking into consideration that Macs run on x86 and iPads on ARM).

      It is not necessary for a tablet to physically be part of a laptop in order to have the two work together seamlessly; this is the cloud era, and if the user wants it, the two can be synced so that what he was doing on one can appear nearly instantly on the other, and it's not necessary to have both devices running the same OS in order for that to happen.

      1. Geoff Campbell Silver badge

        That seems a rather self-referential argument - "Apple haven't done it, therefore it's not the right way to do it".

        I definitely like the direction Microsoft have taken, and I think they have a good chance of pulling off the Holy Grail of completely unifying the desktop and mobile environments, eventually. It's not there yet, certainly, there's lots more to come on the roadmap.

        For now, I'm perfectly happy with the Windows 10 UI across my desktop, Surface Pro "laptop", and phone (recently changed from an Android device). I do a lot of work out on the road, on customer site, in hotel rooms, and the combined environment works perfectly for me.

        As I've already said, if others want to use other approaches and technologies, that's fine by me. I really wish we could move past the angry, tribal bullshit that the entire IT world has sunk into.

        GJC

        1. Updraft102

          No, it's "Apple said it can't be done without harming the user experience on one or both platforms, and after seeing Microsoft's best effort, I agree with Apple." Apple is unwilling to do something if they can't do it well, by their own standards. Microsoft, as we have seen, is perfectly willing to half-ass something that can't be done well, then try to use its monopoly power to force all of us to accept it.

          How is unifying two dissimilar platforms with dissimilar modes of input and dissimilar local resources the 'holy grail'? There's a reason that touch-oriented UIs evolved in a different direction than traditional desktop UIs... they are each suited to their own environment. It's why the controls on a motorcycle are not the same as the controls on a car... trying to graft a car UI onto a cycle or a cycle UI into a car would just be absurd, and so would trying to unify them for no other reason than to say, "Hey, look, we unified them!"

          If Microsoft was not trying to shove this crap down our throats, maybe we could get past what you refer to as "tribal bullshit". Microsoft is not giving those of us who think unifying mobiles and desktops is stupid a choice. There's no option in Windows 10 to have a PC interface that has none of the app nonsense, nor to gain back all of the control we have lost between 8.1 and 10, and we've already been told a hundred times that Windows 10 is the last Windows version there will be. Rather than create a product that is so good that people will want to upgrade, they've created a spectacularly bad one (so much so that scores of people won't take it for free) and tried to force people to use it with their monopoly power.

          Windows has built its user base over the past three decades by doing things a certain way. The degree of control that the user has always had over Windows is a big part of what made it successful, and now that we users have supported MS to this lofty level, they're changing the game and demanding that we serve MS rather than having MS serve us. Not having the option to escape all of this 'app' madness is just one of many issues that all center on Windows 10 being a product that serves MS at the expense of its users.

          If you want to go along with that, it's your choice. I won't. I don't have any reasonable expectation that MS will actually make Windows 10 into something usable, given the steadfast opposition to it they have demonstrated so far, but there is always that little bit of hope that if enough of us demand better, maybe we will get it one day. The only way that would work would be if significant numbers of people refuse to get on board.

          Complaining about WIndows 10 while using Windows 10 isn't good enough. MS doesn't require happy WIndows 10 users; disgruntled ones will do just fine. Complaints only matter if MS perceives them as an impediment to their corporate goals. It's important that people don't give in and use 10 even though they may hate it. They KNOW many of us hate it;as long as they get the adoption rate they want, they don't have to care.

          That's probably why people react so negatively to people who speak out in favor of 10. We're trying to preserve Windows as we know it, as we have known it, and you're on the other side. You're free to do so, of course; it's just an explanation why people may be reacting more strongly than if we were having a debate about something that was purely academic.

          I don't really want to leave the Windows market, even though I am preparing for that eventuality, come 2023. I hope you don't get your way so that I can keep using the platform I am most familiar and comfortable with.

  38. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Insiders are useful idiots

    Useful for beta testing for free.

    It's SatNad's way of crowdsourcing QA testing to the unwashed masses.

    The result is shoddy software, and a sycophantic echo chamber which nudges annoyances ('features') into final builds,

  39. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Microsoft is a tainted brand, most people TOLERATE its products

    Keyword is TOLERATE. They're not fans, they don't proactively reach out for it or evangelize.

    Usually as a necessary evil (e.g. Microsoft Office for productivity).

    For console gamers, they're more likely to be fans of a game, a genre or a publisher instead of the platform or console itself. And as things stand now, there aren't enough Xbox 'AAA' exclusives to wrest the market from Sony's Playstation.

    Personally, the only stuff Microsoft had made that I'm a fan of were the Age of Empires games (AoE 1+2 only) and certain Microsoft mice and keyboards (if Logitech isn't having something available which is comparable in value).

    And not too long ago, people were probably fans of MSN Messenger, probably because it was the de facto standard for instant messaging and rivals such as ICQ and Yahoo Messenger had fallen aside. That changed when Microsoft killed it and semi-merged MSN Messenger into Skype.

    Windows? People just tolerate it for running their win32 applications.

  40. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Ten million can't be wrong

    Either that or they just want a new set of problems to figure out whilst hoping to escape the old set

  41. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Are they kidding?

    "design products in response to feedback and stated needs."

    They have got to be kidding, did users state they NEEDED an OS to be an advertising platform or that Mictosoft make affilaite commissions?

    They they need a SLOWER OS?

    Did they need things to be moved and hidden?

    DId they need a more bloated OS?

    I have used every version of Windows and DOS before it, Win10 is a pile of F'ing Shite, previously when a naff version came out we just held our breath for the next one, but now they are saying they will just add on to WIn10.

    I have never been more compelled to take my home and work (15,000) users off Windows and Office.

    Thus far we have managed to stay with Win7, we are not buying new PC's with Win10.

    So Mixrosoft LISTEN UP, our stated needs are a Win7 that supports current hardware.

    Otherwise we will go with Linux, VM's, a little Citrix and a stated NON Microsoft strategy.

    It is harder to win back a customer than to get a new one, also bear in mind that we are just a cog in a massive wheel of companies that look to us for guidance.

    Once we put the work in to migrate I can't see us ever coming back.

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