Microsoft is using malware-like pop-ups in Windows 11 to get people to ditch Google
3 years ago by MazonnaCara89 to c/technology
its really absurd. it becomes even stupider when considering that many of these assumptions allow mathematical models to be built on top of them, and then those models are treated with such importance and authority. but then they sometimes also get the math wrong. i remember learning a while back that part of the 2009 housing crash was caused by faulty mathematics laid ontop of these weird economic assumptions. the part im talking about is:
The paper, generally referred to as the Dahlem report, condemns a growing reliance over the past three decades on mathematical models that improperly assume markets and economies are inherently stable, and which disregard influences like differences in the way various economic players make decisions, revise their forecasting methods and are influenced by social factors.
the first part refers to a kind of "smoothness assumption", where they approximate the bumpy, jagged graph with a "smooth" curve that is easier to analyze. but it turned out the bumps were there for a reason. oops! the second part of the quote then says that in addition to the faulty smoothness assumption, there were quite a few important things the model flat out ignored
It doesn't require people to act morally, it requires them to act according to their long term self interest, assuming they are... immortal. And we all know human beings are omniscient and immortal. So no problem. /s
But it doesn't, it just requires people to act in their short term self interest, and government's role should be to ensure the long term costs are included in current market prices. So things like Pigouvian taxes and regulations should increase short term costs for things with long term costs.
The problems we see aren't problems with capitalism (capitalism is working as expected in serving short term interests), the problem is with governments not doing their job in accounting for longer term costs.
But that's not how it works. Free market ideas don't expect a perfect world, they instead expect an imperfect one. You don't need everyone to make food decisions, you just need enough people to make good decisions so the market caters to them.
It's the same idea as democracy, you don't need every voter to make a good choice, you just need a plurality. As long as enough people make decent choices enough of the time, democracy works. The free market is just democracy, but with money instead of votes.
In both cases government has a role. I think governments should add in longer term costs to the market, but in a way that preserves choice as much as possible (i.e. carbon taxes instead of carbon limits). I think governments should educate the population to increase the chances that they'll make good decisions at the polls.
In the specific case of Microsoft, things were competitive until the government looked the other way WRT antitrust law. There's a lot of shady stuff that happened in the first couple decades that Microsoft existed, yet they largely got a free pass.
All the big corps get a free pass because of money and power, and this is why free market doesn't work.
Democracy doesn't work either since media is owned by big corps as well. People can only know what they are allowed to know. If you are rich and powerful, you manipulate the media and you manipulate entire elections and decisions.
After a while, you actually see how all these systems are manipulated dally.
Our democracy in the US has lasted ~250 years despite all the nonsense from the rich and powerful. So I think enough of the voting public pays attention to keep things afloat. It has been a slow march downward imo, but nothing unrecoverable.
I can't speak for the rest of the world, but the US seems to go in cycles. That's how democracies seem to end up working, the public gets annoyed enough and demands change, so things get better for a time and then slowly get worse. Then the cycle repeats. It's basically two steps forward, one step back, repeat ad infinitum. Just think, 100 years ago we got women's suffrage, and now that's a given and we're fighting over abortion and equal pay. 100 years before that we were fighting over literal slavery. Some years down the road, we'll likely take those as a given and be fighting over something else.
Democracy works, it's just a messy process that can take a while. But it has worked so far pretty well.
the problem is that not enough people make "good decisions", partly because of how exhausting and time-consuming it is to carefully analyze and consider all the options for every facet of life. for example, there are lots of people who don't want to switch to linux because they think its tedious to pick a distro, learn a new operating system, and find replacements/workarounds for software that doesn't work out of the box on linux. now imagine having to do that for every single aspect of life. how do you pick your toothpaste and deodorant? do you carefully examine all the options each time you go to the store, or do you have a brand you pick without thinking about it because it works fine enough?
another problem with free markets is the inherent progression towards monopolies. this can be seen most readily with the so called natural monopolies (monopolies that emerge because of an extreme barrier to entry). how much choice do you have when it comes to your electricity provider? if they do something you don't like, what can you do other than complain to a politician or move to a new region? aside from natural monopolies, we also see a progression towards monopolies because of inherent efficiencies of producing at scale.
there are other problems as well, such as corruption/lobbying, companies lying to the public, using psychology to manipulate people (link may not be the best source on the subject).
something that i personally find to be a great example of how the free market works in practice: rupert murdoch (among several others working at fox news) knew the 2020 election was not stolen, but pushed the narrative anyway because they didn't want to upset their viewer base.
partly because of how exhausting and time-consuming it is to carefully analyze and consider all the options for every facet of life
And that's solved with trusted sources. I personally don't analyze what toothpaste I get, I ask my dentist or look for the support by the American Dental Association. I don't analyze every car on the market to make a decision, I ask mechanics for opinions and buy the cars they see in their shop the least (or look at defect rates and whatnot that are publicly available). For video games, I read reviews from sites that have given me good advice in the past.
It's often a lot easier to figure out who to trust than it is to figure out which products to buy. And with a free market system, there's a lot of competition both at the product variety side, as well as the product review side, so bad products tend to die and good products tend to succeed. It's not perfect and it takes time to work, and sometimes the market needs governments to step in when the process gets messed up (e.g. manufacturers exerting control over the review process through bribes, intimidation, etc).
inherent progression towards monopolies
This is almost exclusively due to cronyism. For example, ISPs form monopolies by getting regulations passed that discourages new competition, and then sue whichever groups are left so that entering the market costs more than they could hope to earn back. Or companies like Microsoft violate antitrust laws or other anti-competitive practices (i.e. requiring PC manufacturers to pay for Windows/DOS even on PCs that don't ship Windows/DOS, artificially making third party web browsers slower due to blocking APIs, etc), yet they get off with relatively little consequences (AMD v Intel is a counter-example, where the lawsuit was substantial). And so on.
In your example about electricity providers, that's because the deals are made between the power company and cities, not between individuals. I think people would likely be better off if there was actual competition there. Basically, the city would maintain all of the electricity infrastructure in the city, and individual citizens could choose between providers based on cost, eco-friendliness, service, etc, and the cities would require a certain level of power quality (cleanliness of signal, stability of generation, etc). So if you're getting ripped off, it's because of cronyism between the power company and your city/county.
Maybe electricity is a poor option for this (idk, I'm not an expert), but it seems to work pretty well for ISPs. In my area, the city owns the network and you buy service from private companies, who then pay the city a certain amount to maintain the network. If your ISP sucks, you pick another one that offers service on the network, which is a pretty smooth process.
Capitalism works best when you expect selfishness and have the government set and enforce rules. If something cannot feasibly be offered in a competitive fashion, the government should step in and provide it as a public good. Some other things I think should be government-provided:
- ambulances - IMO, if a paramedic decides that you need an ambulance, it should be billed to the city/county/state; this also goes for emergency care until you're stable enough to make a choice as to where to continue care
- city utilities - I can't pick my garbage company, have competing sewer and water lines, etc
- transit - roads, rail, etc should all be publicly owned and operated in the interests of reducing congestion and improving public needs
If something could be competitive but isn't, that's a case for antitrust to step in.
corruption/lobbying, companies lying to the public, using psychology to manipulate people
Those happen regardless of structure. It happens a lot in autocracies, democracies, and everything in between. It seems to happen less in smaller communities, which is why I prefer to have each level of government be as small as possible while remaining effective.
rupert murdoch (among several others working at fox news) knew the 2020 election was not stolen, but pushed the narrative anyway because they didn’t want to upset their viewer base
The only overlap with the free market is that we have a mix of trustworthy and non-trustworthy sources. I count Fox News and CNN both as relatively untrustworthy and always look for second or third sources if anything seems a bit surprising. For example, Fox News claimed the election was stolen with few facts, CNN and a bunch of other sources said it wasn't, along with a bunch of facts. So I don't believe Fox News.
The fact that a number of people believed Fox News isn't particularly important, what's important is that most people didn't believe Fox News. This poll states 55-58% believed Biden was the rightful winner of the election, and that's with a heavy disinformation campaign.
Just think how much worse it would be if the government were in control of the media. We could potentially have those numbers flipped, with the majority believing that the election was stolen.
2024 is the year of the linux desktop!
I mean operating systems are free to be entirely honest
Linux with FUTURE WINE is your solution
future wine is just the future versions of wine, specifically the one that will be perfectly able to run windows programs
Eh, I only use WINE to run games, I've been able to use native Linux stuff for everything else.
yea me too, it was just some info for other ppl
Listen, I want to give the above a shot (It's an idea I've had for a while) but it doesn't just happen, it's very very far from easy, and obnoxiously expensive. Might be cheaper and easier to get to the Moon than to tear down M$' monopoly at this point.
Someone misses reddit
MS screwing us with software. Apple screwing us with hardware upgrades. Linux out there taking all survivors
You rockin' Hannah Montana Linux?
My first one was a random floppy distribution off an ftp server. I then tried SuSE off a CD-ROM and then went with Red Hat for a while. Then Debian, now Ubuntu. Tried FreeBSD but didn't stick. Probably Debian again next. I always prefer Debian on the server though.
I'm not quite there yet, but getting close. I'm somewhere north of 15 years now.
High time for another antitrust, huh
That's the problem
- they are making harder to change the default browser on windows, and broke workaround by chrome and firefox too.
- they don't let you uninstall edge in easy way or without a third party software.
- if you download another browser from edge they try to persuade you in to giving edge a try.
- they are planning to set edge as the default browser on teams.
- they don't give you an easy way to open with another browser the internet result from the windows search bar, they broke EdgeDeflector many times indeed.
And nobody is doing something about it!
The US government really doesn't give a shit, does it. Maybe the EU?
You know that's a fuck up situation when you need to hope that a government union will give a fuck about a tech giant throwing shit at their paying customers
Well, there's at least some hope, looking at the whole USB-C situation, the DSA and the DMA.
So much happens everyday that is more than just technically illegal, law enforcement doesn't even know where to start.
One big thing for the GDPR right now is how many EU-US data transfers are violating the law, because they happen without user consent. If we're being as strict as we should be, EU websites aren't allowed to use Google Analytics, for example
It's sad, because Edge is actually a pretty good browser, but all this shit just makes everyone hate it.
Also, every Google page I visit gives me an annoying "Download Chrome now!" popup, so MS i guess is just using the same strategy Google used.
Haven't installed fresh windows in a few years but I distinctly remember the past few times I installed Windows 10 I had the weirdest issues trying to download Firefox or chrome, like the webpage or download button was broke. I had to get my browser through ninite
“We are aware of these reports and have paused this notification while we investigate and take appropriate action to address this unintended behavior,” says Caitlin Roulston, director of communications
"""unintended"""?
How do you implement shit like this by mistake and push it out to be executed on people's computers by mistake?
It was the intern!!!1!1!!
That's because they're a malware company:
this has been going on in several different forms for years now so I’m just counting the days until the next annoying pop-up appears.
The solution is to not use their products. Use Linux.
I would use Linux if my primary reasons for using a computer worked properly. Games are a lot better these days than it was and always improving so there is light at the end of the tunnel in that respect but Traktor DJ software not so much.
As far as I know the only alternative on Linux is mixxx and that was just no where near as good the last time I used it. Maybe it is time to try it again......
If you're hanging onto Windows for just one app, you could try running it in a virtual machine. I do that for a few work-related apps that have no Linux/web versions and it works great.
You could also dual boot, if VM performance doesn't quite cut it.
I have tried dual booting in the past but it becomes a pita for me as usually the majority of my time spent on a computer is using those things that only worked within windows so why change back just to say browse the web for example.
In the past it was games that were a pain to run but I haven't tried it in the last 3 years or so and know that it has gotten a lot better with the advent of steam giving a shit about Linux more so due in no small part I'm sure of the steam deck.
The problem with virtual machines or WINE or whatever is the current standard for emulating a windows environment is that one application depends heavily on audio latency. It needs to run well and provide as close to zero latency as possible. Like I've said in a few other replies, maybe it is time I tried it out again as it has been a few years since I gave switching over a go, I need to have the time to put into getting it up and running and fixing any problems that arise however :D
Gaming these days is generally excellent thanks to Proton. Certain titles do still have issues, but it's on a case by case basis.
Audio latency is a good point - I don't know how that fares under a VM these days. Pipewire has brought many improvements over Pulse, so it's possible that the situation has also gotten better.
I used WineASIO with Guitar Rig for a long time and it worked well and with acceptably low latency. It can be a hassle to set up though and I don't know how it plays along with pipewire these days.
You can always contact Traktor and ask them to release a linux version.
I have done this with both traktor and serato and got similar responses from both along the lines of "we will suggest it to our tech dept, thanks"
When I tried it last I had problems fully mapping my controller in a way that it worked as expected as well as effects not being as good and overall functionality and work flow not being as smooth as polished as I've been used to using serato and then traktor.
It has been a while since I tried it though so maybe I should give it another bash and see how it has improved over the years.
How is the library management? That is one thing traitor fucking sucks at!
There's a long list of supported controllers. The process for making your own mappings can indeed be a bit cumbersome, but it also seems to be quite powerful in the kind of features it can support, thanks to javascript integration.
Not sure about the library management, seems to work well enough for me.
Win11 is malware, lol. But anyway, I've never come across anything like this for all my years of using Windows Enterprise editions.
The fact that Microsoft's constantly more aggressive use of their OS platform to artificially push their search and cloud platforms hasn't triggered multiple huge antitrust cases is a pretty dire indicator of how little regulators are willing or able to safeguard the public from monopolistic behavior by large tech companies.
Getting out of the Google frying pan and into the Microsoft fire is in no way better. Both options are exploitative anti-user monopolies, and both Chrome and Edge are the same browser engine under different corporate skins that aggressively violate your privacy in numerous ways for their own gain.
Even if Edge was marginally better than Chrome (it's not), allowing monopolistic practices simply for the sake of slightly evening out a corporate race to the bottom is not a good standard. The actual solution is a browser like Firefox that actually has some remote respect and business interest in user privacy, and to aggressively litigate both Microsoft and Google for the use of their dominant service platforms to cross-promote their other products to captive audiences.
Not saying it's okay in any way but Google does this with Chrome all the time on Amy Google page
Guys, I keep reading this, but it's not the same thing. At all. You don't want to get Google's crap? You don't visit their crap websites. There are so many websites in this world to visit to avoid Google's crap. You just don't type anything with google on it in your address bar. The only way to avoid Microsoft's crap is to install another operating system in your desktop or laptop. It's just not the same thing. At all.
Microsoft should be forced to do what they have forced Google to do in Android. At least where I live, in EU. Ballon tips to have the option to use another browser and an option to disable Edge and all the crap asking all the time to use Edge. Like the android ballon tip and the option we have to at least disable Android Chrome.
I fully agree, as a person who actually likes windows, and who's career it made in IT support, I'm sick of this BS they're pulling. I want people to like windows (except Win11, fuck Win11) because is some ways it's really awesome, but that'll never happen like this.
Major difference: Android is open source and Linux-based. Everything is made up of components z which are quite close together, but can be separated. In Windows everything is glued together. You can't separate it. You can't remove explorer.exe (Windows' window manager) and replace it with another. You can replace your android Launcher, and you can replace your Linux desktop environment. Heck, you can even install a tiling window manager on the MacOS, Apple's locked down desktop OS!!!! But not on Windows.
I am sorry but this doesn't make sense. Chromium is an open source software and in no way is glued together with any operating system. Unless you want to glue it. They can just have edge WebView2... glued with the os the same way google has to use android webview when a webview is needed.
Microsoft back in the days was forced to... unglue... Internet Explorer. And they managed to do it in a browser that was.. glued in the first place. No OS has to glue anything no matter the source of it being open or closed. Unless they want to glue.
Microsoft btw just.. managed to unglue... Teams from Office... this is way more difficult to do. They will find a way to unglue Edge lol.
Let me send you to that:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pagfXnqOyOE
And how painful it is to remove Edge:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xdFLL9f9sk
Edge is made to be a part of windows, and difficult, if not impossible to remove. It is currently possible, but for how long?
For you and me maybe. For most people it is. And even if we can do it, if we use specific software that work only on windows we have no option. Windows is a monopoly like Android is for a reason. Because most people for specific reasons can't avoid them. Microsoft should be forced to do what they have forced Google to do in Android. At least where I live, in EU. Ballon tips to have the option to use another browser and an option to disable Edge and all the crap asking all the time to use Edge. Like the android ballon tip and the option we have to at least disable the crap known as Android Chrome.
But at least you don't pay chrome, with windows instead you need to pay a license to use it.
need is an interesting word to use here
Using windows without a license is illegal.
This is like saying you don't need to have a driving license to drive a car because the car doesn't complain about it.
Windows licensing doesn't have enforcement. If there weren't police plenty of people would drive without a license.
Edit:
Checks comments
User posted in Piracy 30 minutes ago
😐
illegal doesn't stop a lot of people from doing a lot of things
I use Arch btw
Thank you thank you
My work computer is macOS and I've never seen a recommendation to use Bing despite using a ton of Microsoft products for work.
My personal computers run Linux, and again, no MS spam.
So yeah, don't use Windows and you won't get MS spam. You should probably also use DuckDuckGo or another privacy-centric search engine.
Slack successfully made Microsoft stop bundling Teams in Microsoft Office through an anti-competition complaint. I'm surprised Google lets them get away with abusing the Windows product as a platform for promoting a search engine. My best guess for why they don't is that the promotion isn't working.
If you have a desktop, buy a second drive. You might even can use your Windows installation for apps with no (good) Linux alternatives.
Ok yeah external hard drive makes sense ! I used windows only for my univ work , they needed Ms office for their reports etc , office 365 basically but since its over now ,I can use the apps I want
External hard drive is probably the cheapest/easiest solution. You can also try a cloud service like dropbox, Google Drive, etc.
External, cloud storage, install Linux on a separate drive and move everything over.
The world is your oyster, man.
Use FreeFileSync to make your backups easily without having to copy everything by yourself, thank me later!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
“We are aware of these reports and have paused this notification while we investigate and take appropriate action to address this unintended behavior,” says Caitlin Roulston, director of communications, in a statement to The Verge.
I wasn’t alone in thinking it was malware, with posts dating back three months showing Reddit users trying to figure out why they were seeing the pop-up.
Microsoft even had to backtrack on plans to force the Chrome default search to Bing for businesses installing its Office apps.
After all, Google runs similar notifications on its webpages to get people to use Chrome or it’s annoying YouTube premium spam.
That could be in the form of the price of a laptop that has a Windows OEM license baked in, or a product key if you built your own PC.
Windows is an important productivity tool for many people, and shouldn’t be treated like a cheap streaming box loaded with ads.
The original article contains 654 words, the summary contains 155 words. Saved 76%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
At the moment I use Windows 10, in the past Windows 7 also along with Kubuntu and others. I think that W10 is the last usable OS from M$, because of this I am not going to update it to W11, the following W12 and the online version for monthly subscription, are going to gradually take over the user's sovereignty over their own PC, with absolute control over it. I am going to continue W10, the gutted version that I use, until support ends in 2025 (probably 2026-27 due to the large number of users), then we will see what there is then as an alternative. Maybe I'll install some distro in dual boot in the meantime, but being online 99% of the time, where the OS used is irrelevant, it doesn't bother me that much at the moment. Anyway I don't use Google or Bing for obvious reasons and none of their services.
Does the same behavior appear with DuckDuckGo, or other alternatives?
Never metioned in the article, and it's a "feature" only spread to a close number of people.
Chaotic good?
Chaotic bad!
Yeah but Chrome bad too!
I have been using Linux Mint in recent years, however the most recent version is quite buggy. It has regressed to 2014 levels of usability and I'm thinking about switching. The last LTS version worked great, best ever in fact. Not sure what explains the difference.
But I already ditched google. For Firefox.
The article talk about google the search engine not the browser
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i’m sure the free market will solve this. we just need to wait for a new company to pop up, make a new operating system, ensure windows programs are properly emulated, convince the majority of people and businesses to use it, and then use its new monopoly for good.
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