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Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

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Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#71

Post by Forgeties79 »

selectively wrote: post #35
wtallis wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the "Desktop & Documents Folders" sync option in iCloud on by default? I've never used that feature, and it's a bit buried so it's hard to enable accidentally, but I haven't set up a new Mac from scratch in a long time so I don't know if it is a trap for new users the way OneDrive is.

It is on by default as of the last time I went through new Mac user setup, which was during....Sequoia, I think.

It isn’t until you explicitly log in to your appleID and choose to do it during setup. It is very clearly laid out. Onedrive bills itself as essential to windows’s functionality.

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#72

Post by reddalo »

scorpionfeet wrote: post #58
reddalo wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux Mint is super easy to use. I've personally battle tested it with my elder parents. Given all the nagware present in Windows 11, I'd even say Linux Mint is easier than Windows. The most difficult part is probably the installation itself.

Not if you are coming from windows and are not a tech nerd. I don’t want to end up being tech support for some non techie I coerced into Linux. It is nowhere near as seamless as zealots like to believe. Been having this discussion since 1997.

Have you actually tried a modern distro like Linux Mint?

Seriously, you don't even need to touch the terminal, everything is neatly organized in a single control panel (unlike the messy >2 control panels situation of Windows).

You can easily install all the applications you want; even games thanks to Steam and Proton.

It's easy to use, there are no ads, no preinstalled adware, no nagware, everything is fast and clean.

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#73

Post by raincole »

legitster wrote: post #67

We've really got to stop calling every bad UI a dark pattern. "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by incompetence." Having worked at MSFT I can tell you there's a LOT more incompetence than malice.

This particular case isn't a dark pattern, but the fact OSes are written under the assumption that users want to create an account for cloud services is.

(Yes, by this definition Google, Microsoft and Apple are all dark patterners.)

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#74

Post by eterm »

antisthenes wrote: post #39
jmcphers wrote: post #24

Google is no better. My family mostly uses iPhones, and on a big extended family vacation, I suggested we use Google Photos to create a shared album to document the trip. Everyone installed the Google Photos app on their iPhone so they could contribute... which resulted in all of them having their email accounts disabled . What happened? Google Photos on the iPhone backs up all your photos by default, and, like Micro…

It also doesn't help that Google's free tier (15GB) is laughably small in 2026. HDD capacity and Google's profits grew many-fold since that was last increased (in 2012-ish?).

It does seem ridiculous that over 20 years ago, gmail was advertised with a real-time allowance ticking away increasing, which started at an incredibly generous 1GB allowance and you could watch it tick up in real time faster than you could fill it with mail.

People designed "gmail-as-storage" apps to take advantage of this.

20 years later and we get a pathetic 15GB for mail, photos and everything else combined.

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#75

Post by raincole »

geophile wrote: post #33

From perusing reddit, I see some Windows users tempted to consider Linux, often because of Windows 11. But then, many of them won't move because: it doesn't work just like Windows; there is some Windows application they must have, or maybe they just don't want to learn the alternatives. Or they use word/excel/powerpoint and have to interact with others who do also. The brainwashing, high tolerance for pain and misery…

Call it brainwashing or whatever. But the reality is that even one single popular app not working out of box is enough barrier preventing people from switching.

I've tried to convince people to use Linux. The conversation usually ended when they realize Photoshop isn't natively support Linux. And after many attempts, I ended up being converted to Windows + WSL.

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#76

Post by rectang »

legitster wrote: post #67

We've really got to stop calling every bad UI a dark pattern. "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by incompetence." Having worked at MSFT I can tell you there's a LOT more incompetence than malice.

Selective incompetence for fun and profit:

Pricing mistakes which make the supermarket money are unfortunate but low priority. Pricing mistakes which cost the supermarket money must be fixed immediately.

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#77

Post by Terr_ »

eterm wrote: post #74
antisthenes wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also doesn't help that Google's free tier (15GB) is laughably small in 2026. HDD capacity and Google's profits grew many-fold since that was last increased (in 2012-ish?).

It does seem ridiculous that over 20 years ago, gmail was advertised with a real-time allowance ticking away increasing, which started at an incredibly generous 1GB allowance and you could watch it tick up in real time faster than you could fill it with mail. People designed "gmail-as-storage" apps to take advantage of this. 20 years later and we get a pathetic 15GB for mail, photos and everything else combined.

TBF that's a little bit apples-to-orchards, since publicly routed e-mails have certain expectable size/frequency characteristics compared to, say, all the videos someone possesses.

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#78

Post by BLKNSLVR »

liendolucas wrote: post #30

From the WinUtil screenshots presented in the article I'm absolutely shocked about all the things that you presumably want to turn off or delete to have a "clean" Windows (to some extent if that's possible at all). It's also ridiculous that you need an external tool to easily disable/remove/uninstall every single thing you don't want . I haven't used Windows since many many years ago and the few times I sit down to i…

It was the need to do increasingly more post-setup configuration with each iteration of Windows after Win7 that finally pushed me to using Linux as my daily driver a few years ago. Especially when a few of these settings would get switched back to defaults after a Windows Update.

These days, the amount of background services that Windows runs just makes it feel as if Windows itself is increasingly malware. You don't need a virus present for modern day machines, with massive compute resources, to be bogged down and running like a 486 back in the day.

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#79

Post by Esn024 »

liendolucas wrote: post #30

From the WinUtil screenshots presented in the article I'm absolutely shocked about all the things that you presumably want to turn off or delete to have a "clean" Windows (to some extent if that's possible at all). It's also ridiculous that you need an external tool to easily disable/remove/uninstall every single thing you don't want . I haven't used Windows since many many years ago and the few times I sit down to i…

Winhance for removing things like OneDrive and the option to KEEP them removed even if a future Windows Update tries to reinstall them. You can also save your configuration to easily get all your preferences back on a fresh Windows install. I use this instead of WinUtil (which I haven't tried yet... is there any way in which it is better?).

Windhawk for quality of life improvements if you don't like some of Windows's defaults. For example, I use it to have two rows on my taskbar and smaller icons (which was disabled in Windows 11), always open Classic Notepad instead of the new one (it loads much faster), and add multi-step "undo" to the Classic Notepad (the only thing I didn't like about it), among other things.

Re: Microsoft is employing dark patterns to goad users into paying for storage?

#80

Post by xzjis »

legitster wrote: post #67

We've really got to stop calling every bad UI a dark pattern. "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by incompetence." Having worked at MSFT I can tell you there's a LOT more incompetence than malice.

The problem is that this incompetence is the result of (bad) choices by Microsoft's management. I'm not even talking about middle managers but the C-suite, who only care about satisfying shareholders, not about creating good working conditions or making sure the product is good.
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