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2015: The year that Microsoft started getting the benefit of the doubt

arstechnica.com

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Re: 2015: The year that Microsoft started getting the benefit of the doubt

#11

Post by clessg »

martythemaniak wrote: post #4
1123581321 wrote: post #2

I agree with all the examples mentioned in this article, but I think the beginning of 2014 was the year public opinion started to change. Nadella came out of the gate strong in early 2014. Just before that, Mike Krahulik's post about the Surface Pro 2 at the end of 2013 was a turning point for the perception of the product by people who prefer iOS/Android/Linux. ( http://www.penny-arcade.com/news/post/2013/10/28/surf…

Public opinion changes when mainstream entities (people/organizations) validate something new. Microsoft has been coming out with good stuff for several years now, but that opinion has been restricted to a subset of technophiles. If in 2014 you told someone about tablets and styluses, you'd either get a dumb look or the standard Jobs like ("you're doing in wrong") So what happened in 2015? Well, Apple validated (copi…

Related: http://i.imgur.com/YBBa3dW.jpg

Edit: Ninja'd.

Re: 2015: The year that Microsoft started getting the benefit of the doubt

#12

Post by valarauca1 »

tsunamifury wrote: post #3

Benefit of the doubt is nice, but delivery has been poor to nonexistent. Microsoft is barely taking back its own declining market of non-phones -- while making a wild bet on augmented reality. I feel like the media wants to paint a comeback story a la Apple a lot more than one actually exists.

>I feel like the media wants to paint a comeback story a la Apple a lot more than one actually exists.

In terms of an Apple come back story that's blatantly false. Microsoft was never in dire financial straights since practically the mid-80's.

The Benefit of the Doubt is more because of their attitude to the OSS community. For nearly its entire life Micro$oft has been seen as the prime enemy of the OSS community, a role which it willingly and almost happily embraced.

Today Microsoft has open sources it main .NET runtime. Opening up C#/F# 2 great languages. Its opening the JS Engine in Edge. Compared to Gates/Balmer area Microsoft it very much feels like a different company.

Re: 2015: The year that Microsoft started getting the benefit of the doubt

#13

Post by gotchange »

martythemaniak wrote: post #4
1123581321 wrote: post #2

I agree with all the examples mentioned in this article, but I think the beginning of 2014 was the year public opinion started to change. Nadella came out of the gate strong in early 2014. Just before that, Mike Krahulik's post about the Surface Pro 2 at the end of 2013 was a turning point for the perception of the product by people who prefer iOS/Android/Linux. ( http://www.penny-arcade.com/news/post/2013/10/28/surf…

Public opinion changes when mainstream entities (people/organizations) validate something new. Microsoft has been coming out with good stuff for several years now, but that opinion has been restricted to a subset of technophiles. If in 2014 you told someone about tablets and styluses, you'd either get a dumb look or the standard Jobs like ("you're doing in wrong") So what happened in 2015? Well, Apple validated (copi…

What you're basically describing in your comment is the concept of "cultural hegemony" [0] popularized by Gramsci in Marxist philosophy but superimposed on tech context.

Apple clearly acting as the bourgeoisie of the today's tech world where Microsoft is relegated to the proletarian rank and file and because of that Apple somewhat gets to dictate what are the accepted social and cultural norms in the tech world and we the proletariat have to just comply with their edicts or face some form of "tech ostracism".

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_hegemony

Re: 2015: The year that Microsoft started getting the benefit of the doubt

#14

Post by antome »

deanclatworthy wrote: post #5

They've done some brilliant things for developers this year, but sadly shipped a giant spyware operating system at the same time. From what I've read people are still trying to determine everything it's calling home.

I was hoping someone would be updating a list of IPs and domains which you could simply block at the router level

Re: 2015: The year that Microsoft started getting the benefit of the doubt

#15

Post by georgeecollins »

One thing that struck me about this article is that they said that if the Surface Book had been introduced by Samsung no one would have paid attention. Intuitively this seems correct, but I wonder what exactly Samsung has done to be thought of so little. I used to have the first Galaxy Note. In the era of the iPhone 4s, it was a cool phone.

Samsung has the ability to create amazing hardware. What could Samsung do to make itself interesting to a technically sophisticated audience?

Re: 2015: The year that Microsoft started getting the benefit of the doubt

#16

Post by exprI »

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #10
deanclatworthy wrote: post #5

They've done some brilliant things for developers this year, but sadly shipped a giant spyware operating system at the same time. From what I've read people are still trying to determine everything it's calling home.

which remains for me the main reason why regardless of it is now being cool again I still avoid it like the plague. another funny thing is that they have improved their OS security so much that it is now considered harder than Linux, and Apple

Little criticism, followed by a huge compliment. Usually shilling.

Considered “harder” by whom? Windows enthusiasts have certainly considered Windows to be more sophisticated since the first public version of NT, and more secure by XP SP2, at the very latest.

Re: 2015: The year that Microsoft started getting the benefit of the doubt

#20

Post by Zikes »

deanclatworthy wrote: post #5

They've done some brilliant things for developers this year, but sadly shipped a giant spyware operating system at the same time. From what I've read people are still trying to determine everything it's calling home.

There are some things I love about Windows 10, like virtual desktops (welcome to the 90s Microsoft!) but there are some things that irk me:

* Pretty login screen photos, with a link at the top-right saying "Like what you see?". I click the link expecting to get the source for the image, instead I get "Cool, we'll show you more like that." So much for that nice new desktop background I was hoping for.

* Automatic updates leak RAM like a bloody sieve. I have 16GB of RAM, and every time it downloads an automatic update that RAM will inevitably fill to the brim. Eventually it'll also fill the page file, and the whole thing virtually grinds to a halt until I finally reboot and install the updates.

* Automatic update finishes and I see a friendly message saying "don't worry, all your files are right where you left them!" Two minutes later I see "Program X is not compatible with this version of Windows, so we uninstalled it for you."

* Frequently resets default programs to MS applications, usually as a result of a large automatic update. The inconsistency of this is the weirdest bit, it never resets the default browser, but every few weeks I have to re-set the default PDF reader and image browser.

* Managing screen resolutions/positions is not "advanced". Microsoft needs to sort out their configuration screens, this half-arsed hybrid Win10/Windows 9X system is just getting worse and worse.

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