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from the trying-to-get-the-scoop-on-what-they-scoop-up dept.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has accused Microsoft of disregarding user choice and privacy with Windows 10. In a scathing editorial, EFF employee Amul Kalia calls on Microsoft to "come clean with its user community" over a growing number of Windows 10 privacy concerns. "Windows 10 sends an unprecedented amount of usage data back to Microsoft," explains Kalia, noting that enabling Cortana increases the amount of data passed to Microsoft. Privacy advocates have argued that Windows 10 sends back location, text input, voice input, touch input, websites you visit, and other telemetry data to Microsoft.
"While users can disable some of these settings, it is not a guarantee that your computer will stop talking to Microsoft's servers," says Kalia. "A significant issue is the telemetry data the company receives." Microsoft has previously insisted it anonymizes telemetry data, but the EFF is concerned the company hasn't explained exactly how it does this. "Microsoft also won't say how long this data is retained, instead providing only general timeframes."
While telemetry data is clearly a concern, the EFF focuses on Microsoft's confusing link between this data and security patches. "Microsoft has tried to explain this lack of choice by saying that Windows Update won't function properly on copies of the operating system with telemetry reporting turned to its lowest level," claims Kalia. "Microsoft is claiming that giving ordinary users more privacy by letting them turn telemetry reporting down to its lowest level would risk their security since they would no longer get security updates."
The story then proceeds to blast Microsoft's Windows 10 upgrade tactics, as well.
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Tuesday August 23 2016, @03:06PM
Office 2013 was literally eating tens of pages at a time from some of the documents I maintain for seemingly random reasons. Other times I'd send somebody on 2010 a document, and while I could see everything, they'd say they were missing a page here or there. Absolutely unacceptable.
There is a reason the software is called "Word", and not "Text". You were using it far beyond spec, so what did you expect? ;-)
People have laughed at me when they find out I use LibreOffice. Yes, laughed at me. I'd explain why I switched, but it didn't make a difference. I'm using the weirdo dweeb office suite that only misogynerds use. Apparently the cool kids are just fine with the documents being mangled, because Office is what everyone uses. Only kale-eating dweebs use something else.
Depending on the use-case, I would probably also sneer at the decision. At least for really long texts, LibreOffice is not even coming close to the comfort of LaTeX. In university I wrote most of my homeworks with LaTeX, including my final thesis, and had far less headache than most of my co-students.
But the point is, most people are too semi-lazy to want to learn about advantages / disadvantages of the different tools. Semi-lazy, because in the long run they put a lot more effort than they would have to otherwise, so it doesn't really qualify as "lazy". To convince those, one has to be entertaining/witty. Ridiculing MS Office is much more efficient than bringing good arguments. Laughing at nerds is cool, to diss software is cool, to show real interest usually isn't.
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday August 23 2016, @05:41PM
One of the big strengths of LaTeX imho is how snugly it will fit in a version control system (git for me for now until something better comes along). I've never written anything worth publishing, but somewhere in the deep dark bowels of my home directory, there's a stash of half-realized fiction will full revision history including a few branches to nowhere. I've heard success stories about collaborative writing as well.
Those documents I maintain probably would work better in LaTeX, but other people who are deathly afraid of backslashes do occasionally need to use them for read-write purposes, and there's always “what if our wizard gets hit by a bus?” (I'm sure there's a Harry Potter joke there somewhere.) My co-workers are not the sharpest tools in the shed. I have my reasons for staying where I am (probably one of the highest paid non-executive person in the company), but I'm almost wanting to move to fast food or lawn care or something so that my co-workers will be more educated and intelligent. :/
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Tuesday August 23 2016, @08:45PM
But the point is, most people are too semi-lazy to want to learn about advantages / disadvantages of the different tools. Semi-lazy, because in the long run they put a lot more effort than they would have to otherwise, so it doesn't really qualify as "lazy".
I don't know if laziness is the actual problem. There tends to be a deep seated fear in some people about learning anything new, even if it only takes a few minutes to learn it. I used to joke with my co-workers about how I would happily spend an hour learning a way to save five minutes every month, while they resisted spending five minutes learning to save an hour every month. Now of course I have to confess that the learning part for me was more enjoyable than the actual work, but I really did greatly increase the efficiency of my work performance.