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Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

zdnet.com

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Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#121

Post by hga »

notsotrue wrote: post #108
keithpeter wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The whole process made me feel like I was losing my mind." And perhaps Microsoft shareholders are beginning to feel as if they might be losing their capital soonish... This sounds like The End.

A tad hyperbolic, don't you think?

Not necessarily, it's entirely possible for a company to severely damage itself by creating too much friction in the sales process.

This is the sort of thing that helped kill Sun, although the circumstances were sufficiently different it wouldn't play out in the same way: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11601146 (especially when much of the competition is entirely free, e.g. AWS doesn't run on Windows).

Same thing with Xerox not all that long ago, they had a near death experience because the salesmen got so much pointless process larded into what they had to do to do their jobs. Note also one of the newer HP CEOs who upon getting his job said that one of his top priorities was streamlining the sales process.

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#122

Post by kibwen »

lake99 wrote: post #111
TheRealDunkirk wrote: post #102

The ball is back in Apple's court. They seem to take the end user more seriously, but they've been mixed. I made a comment taking Microsoft to task when their surreptitious telemetry came to light, and someone pointed me to proof that Apple was doing about the same thing. This is Apple's chance to continue to distance themselves from their competition. They've done well standing up for privacy, with the recent FBI de…

SteamOS has already been released[1], but all they do is add some stuff on Debian. But Steam/Valve does not seem to be too committed to Linux. Their Linux games are often quite buggy[2], and in my experience, support is slow. [1] http://store.steampowered.com/steamos/buildyourown [2] https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Dota-2/issues

I see SteamOS as a hedge against Valve's fear that Microsoft will lock down Windows in the same way that Apple has locked down iOS. Rather than a core of their strategy, it's a last-ditch lifeboat in case third-party app stores become verboten.

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#123

Post by hackuser »

zem wrote: post #43
hackuser wrote: post #15

I want devices that I, the owner, control, whether I'm a small business or enterprise or individual. This is important for many reasons, from security to freedom-to-tinker to using the device I own in the way I want. It was once an accepted standard in IT. Now, can anyone name a current handheld or desktop system that provides end-user control? If you don't think security, including privacy, is important, consider wh…

do laptops with linux preloaded on them not count? you can get a dell machine with rhel or ubuntu installed on it, and afaik you are free to do whatever you want thereafter.

> do laptops with linux preloaded on them not count?

Isn't the bootloader locked down?

Also, that's probably not a realistic option for most end-users.

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#124

Post by mjevans »

cm2187 wrote: post #90
GigabyteCoin wrote: post #31

And this particular sysadmin-for-my-family will no longer allow windows to be installed on any of our computers whenever they are in need of a reinstall. Windows is becoming more and more like Facebook. Too many users changed a setting you don't agree with? Just block access to that setting or call it something else to confuse enough people to the point that the numbers are "good enough" for management. Almost every…

One thing that windows 10 absolutely hates users changing is firewall rules. I regularly see my custom rules disappearing. This is unacceptable .

I've seen this with file associations too.

I feel like there MUST be some way of...

1) Asking 'correctly' now...

2) Automating this from a .cmd script or something so I don't have to manually hunt through the GIANT, UNSERACHABLE (it is now sort-able thankfully), REFRESHING on EVERY CHANGE list of file associations.

Unfortunately I haven't actually looked in to how to do this... but if new versions of open source applications that I use aren't doing this automatically that sort of indicates that such a search might not be the best use of my time.

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#125

Post by linux_girl »

notsotrue wrote: post #108
keithpeter wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The whole process made me feel like I was losing my mind." And perhaps Microsoft shareholders are beginning to feel as if they might be losing their capital soonish... This sounds like The End.

A tad hyperbolic, don't you think?

He's a paid Apple astro-turfer

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#126

Post by hackuser »

794CD01 wrote: post #66
hackuser wrote: post #15

I want devices that I, the owner, control, whether I'm a small business or enterprise or individual. This is important for many reasons, from security to freedom-to-tinker to using the device I own in the way I want. It was once an accepted standard in IT. Now, can anyone name a current handheld or desktop system that provides end-user control? If you don't think security, including privacy, is important, consider wh…

Most things that were "once an accepted standard in IT" are horribly insecure. The end user wanting a system he/she controls is very much one of them. Microsoft taking away control from users, especially when it came to forcing them to take updates, is probably the biggest change they could possibly have made to improve the overall security of the internet.

> Microsoft taking away control from users, especially when it came to forcing them to take updates, is probably the biggest change they could possibly have made to improve the overall security of the internet.

Shouldn't the end user get to decide for themselves whether Microsoft can control the computer the user paid for, that sits in their home or office, and that contains their private and otherwise confidential information?

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#127

Post by 794CD01 »

hackuser wrote: post #126
794CD01 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most things that were "once an accepted standard in IT" are horribly insecure. The end user wanting a system he/she controls is very much one of them. Microsoft taking away control from users, especially when it came to forcing them to take updates, is probably the biggest change they could possibly have made to improve the overall security of the internet.

> Microsoft taking away control from users, especially when it came to forcing them to take updates, is probably the biggest change they could possibly have made to improve the overall security of the internet. Shouldn't the end user get to decide for themselves whether Microsoft can control the computer the user paid for, that sits in their home or office, and that contains their private and otherwise confidential i…

They used to, and they decided to download and execute random malware, and never take security updates.

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#128

Post by 794CD01 »

pdkl95 wrote: post #88
794CD01 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most things that were "once an accepted standard in IT" are horribly insecure. The end user wanting a system he/she controls is very much one of them. Microsoft taking away control from users, especially when it came to forcing them to take updates, is probably the biggest change they could possibly have made to improve the overall security of the internet.

> taking away control from users If you don't control something, you de facto don't own it. You're advocating for a future without personal property. If you doubt this, see John Deere. > improve the overall security of the internet When someone else has remote control over your system, your system is - by definition - insecure. The recent drama involving the FBI and an iphone is a perfect example: the phone is insecu…

I'm not advocating. I am pointing out that user control is fundamentally anti-security. Bad security may very well be worth the tradeoff if you value other things like freedom, fashion, backwards compatibility, fewer restarts, price, etc.

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#129

Post by hackuser »

jrcii wrote: post #54
Someone1234 wrote: post #2

If Microsoft wants SMBs to use Enterprise then make the Enterprise edition more easily available to SMBs, don't try to force them to move to it by making petty little changes to make their life more difficult. I can go on the Google Apps website right now and buy myself seats with a few clicks and a few minutes. If I want to buy Windows Enterprise licenses it will take weeks, cost an unclear amount (at the onset), an…

I lived through the exact same disaster. I spent HOURS on the phone trying to acquire a license for Windows 7 Enterprise, I needed it for Hyper-V. Microsoft's main number, dead-end IVR system. Tried the Microsoft Store, they routed me to the dead-end IVR system. 50 or so minutes after my initial attempt I got some person that could barely speak English from India routing me to a voicemail, a couple of times Microsoft…

Unfortunately, that is common with many large companies, including Microsoft. I've practically begged them to take my money but sometimes nobody seems to know how to do it.

Re: Microsoft no longer allows admins to block Windows Store access in Win10 Pro

#130

Post by [deleted] »

unprepare wrote: post #82
794CD01 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most things that were "once an accepted standard in IT" are horribly insecure. The end user wanting a system he/she controls is very much one of them. Microsoft taking away control from users, especially when it came to forcing them to take updates, is probably the biggest change they could possibly have made to improve the overall security of the internet.

are you under the impression that automatic security updates is what people dislike about windows 10? Its mostly the: telemetry openended ToS poor upgrade/reinstall behavior resulting in lost licenses overly complicated licensing structure (with articles like this showing the professional license feature set degrading over time) forced integration of unrelated products (cortana, bing) integration of advertising into…

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