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Microsoft Unhappy With Beta Testers, Demands Answers (computerworld.com)
Freshly Exhumed writes: Microsoft has mandated that the feedback functionality built into Windows Insider Preview beta be switched on -- a change from earlier when testers could block questions from the company about what users thought of specific features. Starting with Build 14271 and newer, the frequency in which Windows 10 will ask for your feedback will be locked to 'Automatically (Recommended)' in the Settings app. This would seem to disrupt what has traditionally been seen as a tacit understanding between corporations and their beta testers/sandboxers in that the latter would volunteer their time, effort, CPU cycles, possible hardware failures/breakage, and more as part of a bargain to receive feedback or to test fly the beta OS with internal software environments in private. Microsoft would now seem to be altering that relationship.
Oh good grief! If you don't want Microsoft to gather information from your beta testing of Microsoft products, don't become a beta tester. I mean, is that what beta testers do, use the product and give feed back as requested? The simple solution if you don't like this policy is to not sign up to beta test Microsoft products if you don't really want to be hassled with feedback, "telemetry", and so forth.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Microsoft would now seem to be altering that relationship.
Pray that they don't alter it any further.
"Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
Less altering the relationship I think than enforcing it. Too many beta testers were, it sounds like, treating the beta test as a sneak preview or early-access program and taking advantage of the offering without providing the feedback that's their part of the agreement. All Microsoft's doing is taking out the switch that lets them avoid being bugged for the feedback they agreed to give. It'll annoy people who were giving feedback but aren't having problems with those particular areas, but they're heavily outnumbered by the people who weren't giving feedback at all. Yet another case of the greedy breaking things for everybody, I suppose.
I actually was a Windows Insider and loved it but then I started getting dinged with prompts for feedback every time I opened a new program or used a new feature they added. It isn't that bad, but when you're in the middle of trying to do something it is annoying as hell so I don't answer them. Over time this actually changes my habits and made me stop answering any of them all together. I was giving them feedback. They asked for more and I started giving them none.
How about, "But I like my Windows machine."
Seriously. I know linux, and use it on servers. ChromeOS seems to me like a bad idea, just trading one giant corporation for another. Apple drives me crazy enough on my iOS toys, and I'd rather not pay their premium.
The problem with quotes on the internet, is that nobody bothers to check their veracity. -- Abraham Lincoln
But imagine certain group of people like journalists/reviewers, and MS know about them using beta products to gain insight/benchmark and writing review. Obviously you don't want MS to start gaming the system knowing which beta copy they are using and tweak the setting that would work well for particular system/task, but not working well in real life. So, yes, there are certain exception that I would rather have MS not knowing everything, even if those people accept the terms.
"Journalists / reviewers" don't fit the specs for the beta testers Microsoft is talking about. If Microsoft hands you a piece of software for the specific purpose of "beta testing" it and providing feedback, that is fundamentally different than being dishonest and signing up the beta test according to Microsoft's rules for beta testers, even though you know you're going to blow them off and just write some article for your blog or whatever.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
I'm a fan of Linux but have to say:
1. There are plenty of people who have over 500 Steam titles, so that's not necessarily a good trade-off (losing over half my library?). Also graphics drivers are still pretty hit-and-miss on Linux unless you're lucky to have specific hardware.
2./3. Libreoffice is great for personal use, but if your whole company/job doesn't use it then you might be stuck with whatever they use for formatting and compatibility reasons. Hopefully it's Google Docs/Sheets/etc. or you're stuck back on Office for Mac or PC. In general the alternatives, to OS-specific software, are always going to be lacking one or more features the original program has even if they have a bunch of other great features added.
4. There is an efficiency involved in using the tools you're experienced with, especially for those who are using a tool on Windows or Mac OSX that doesn't play nice with other operating systems.
"#1 point" Really not sure where that's heading, but you could say the same about Mac OSX and Chrome OS, as well as Ubuntu or the GNOME interface. Pretty much every modern operating system except perhaps some more advanced variations of Linux and BSD will "insult your intelligence" by making assumptions that are meant to improve work-flow.
The privacy stuff going on with Windows 8+ is probably the same as what already happens with the Google Chrome OS, but still worrying.
1. But I use windows for gaming! Steam has more than 200 titles that run just fine in Linux
It does. But like 90% of everything, most of them suck. There's a handful that are good. Games aren't fungible - it may be that just a single, specific title not being available on Linux is enough to keep certain people on windows.
Personally, I run a linux machine and a windows machine, with a kvm switch. I game on windows, and do everything else on linux. Works for me.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
Typical post-Gates Microsoft, blame the testers rather than the recipients of the feedback. I have a feeling they're ignoring all the valid feedback as it doesn't fit their narrative and justify what they're paying their developers.
"With Windows 8 we hear your negative feedback but we don't care for it since we know what's better for you and you're going to like it. Or not use it. It's your choice."
As someone who's been beta testing and feedbacking Microsoft products since they had beta tests, I threw in the towel with Windows 8 because they ignored the feedback concerning actual bugs and typographical errors.
Screw you Microsoft, you should have listened when people cared more than you claim to.
Over the years: 1 mobo, 1 hard drive, 2 graphics cards, 1 monitor all due to betta testing NT4.0
Bettas are notoriously aggressive. Although it was probably the water that killed your hardware.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
Interesting points, and I fully agree with you when it comes to tech people like us.
But if you think that your comments are scalable, then you probably have not dealt with non technical people, who are just trying to get work done(tm)
For instance:
- girlfriend works in some marketing/accounting/business unit and needs to finish some documentation at home during the weekend because of a late request
- grandma wants to see her grandchildren photos, which are embedded in that powerpoint. Background music is important.
- Non-Tech father needs to rework some documents done in the universal tool of all Lords, namely Excel, which office people bastardize via macros and whatever to serve a schizophrenic life of being spreadsheet, text editor, database, time planner, bug tracker, and version control tool all at once.
- Friend want to install password manager, tax program, adobe lightroom/Picasa, iTunes, pick non-web-based program, etc. and doesn't feel like learning anything about wine unless he/she is going to drink it.
So if you truly believe what you wrote, then you are either too young, or you work in a small technical company, or are a freelancer, or are one of those people expecting the world to change and learn to think and behave like us.
My heart is with you. I even use Linux (Xubuntu) as my daily driver at home, and I used to think like you trying to change the world. But as you have said yourself, times have changed and I have learned the reality. And even I need to dual boot to Windows every once in a while.
Unlike most here on slashdot I do actually want to use and learn your products. I really do as an IT professional I need to be up to date and I have the power to recommend your products and give you more money too.
Here is what everyone including myself think and why you are receiving negative feedback.1st off I want to say job well done with Windows 7. It brought me back from Linux as my main desktop as I know have linux stuff in vm's. What we liked was it was rock solid, stable, well tested, and worked and was well tested with the enterprise environment.
Windows 10 is very very flakely and loaded with privacy concerns since you fired all your QA. I tried last week for the 4th time to install Windows 10 on my desktop as a fresh upgrade. Too many bugs. What is unique as all 3 times I received a different bug. DNS issues, graphical artifacts, names cut short like c:\users\ti, drivers for Samsung pro SATA replaced by MS making system unbootable, etc. Corporations and inviduals have privacy concerns too. Make the pro version not track so you can monetize. Many businesses (all of them) process credit cards. How do you know that info is not being sent?? Not everyone is a big enterprise who buys the enterprise edition just for your information.
Hire some QA back and address privacy and give options for paying customers to have no tracking instead of relying on users and I may recommend 10.1 or 10.2 after redstone and all will be forgiven just like after Vista, 7 fixed things.
It is a shame because I started liking your products recently.
http://saveie6.com/
"I am altering the deal . . . pray that I don't alter it any further" has nothing to do with praying to the Abrahamic Deity.
It has more to do with telling Microsoft that their "sad devotion to that ancient religion has not conjured up" a stable release of Windows 10.
If you don't participate in the beta test the right way Microsoft will "find your lack of faith . . . disturbing" and start choking you over an open port on your PC . . .
However, what irritates me and most here is MS fired it's QA last year. Literally not a single QA person and this is why it has telemtry and demands feedback. We are the beta testers.
posting A/c to preserve modding. But this comment needed responding too as it is utter BULLSHIT. Microsoft has a shit ton of QA people across all product lines (though it might not seem like it sometimes), last year they got rid of redundant/overlapping areas. If you have information that says they fired them all then I think a citation is in order.
You can sometimes roll back the driver in device manager, but that feature is flakey. Better just:
Control Panel -> System -> System Properties -> Hardware -> Device installation settings and disable driver updates in there. Some KBs will still spuriously install drivers as part of some "hot fix" or whatever, but since disabling this I had much less issues with devices suddenly misbehaving.
Keeping drivers on auto update in windows is downright crazy now, as microsoft for some inexplicable reason decided to stop QA vetting drivers and push whatever garbage they get their hands on.