| > The devices part is all but kaput, | > given that they've managed to entirely destroy Nokia, | > which used to make 40% of all cellphones, and that | > the Windows/Metro smart phones have been a near | > total failure. | | Nokia was pretty dead before MS bought it. I don't blame MS for their | decline. Apple and Samsung killed them. BTW, how is your Blackeberry | holding up? |
I've wondered what was up with that. An MS executive took over at Nokia. I thought maybe the plan was that he'd sell out to MS. Sort of a trojan horse CEO. But I know someone who used to work there and he said the Nokia people generally wanted him. The only sensible explanation I can think of is that MS believed they could step into being a third company in a phone triopoly if they had the Nokia infrastructure, patents, etc. There's been speculation that they could have made it work if they'd immediately gone to Android and dumped Metro. I don't know. I get the sense that the whole story is not public.
I'm afraid I don't get the Blackberry joke. :) I know they're in tough shape. The connection? Personally I don't use cellphones. I have a Trachpone, paying $20/3 months, which I use as a portable phone booth and to relate to cellphone addicts who no longer even know how to answer a doorbell and expect visitors to call from the front porch instead. (!) Aside from that, I can read maps, don't use Facebook, have no interest in game diddling, and don't want to carry a tracking collar that charges me $100+/month for the privilege.
In addition to all of that, I quite enjoy the luxuries of time and space. Cellphones tend to collapse all that. Everyone and everything is imminent. I don't want to take a walk -- around the neighborhood or around a wilderness -- and have someone be able to interrupt me. I'm "out". I went out for a reason. I want to look at the trees and have some solitude. With a cellphone there's no more going "out". That feels tragic to me.
| > | > So it's mostly services. They're not mentioning | > software anymore. Microsoft used to be the biggest | > *software* company in the world, and they no longer | > advertise that as their product. Shouldn't that tell | > you something? It's not only their ads. It's also their | > official stated position to their media and shareholders. | | It gives me a hint, but it is not hard evidence. | >
You deleted the link -- one of many -- to their official statements. What constitutes evidence if not official statements? Of course they could change course if things change. But as of now they're a services company.
| > | > Microsoft started all of this back in 1998. The Active | > Desktop theme was meant to put ads on the Desktop. | > Remeber the Channel Bar? | | Actually, no. |
All OEM windows used to come with a rectangle on the Desktop, full of ads. The only one I remember was Disney. Each ad was a "channel". They called that rectangle the Channel Bar. The whole idea was ludicrous. I'm not surprised that you never noticed. It was an idea ahead of its time. Or perhaps behind its time. Bill Gates was widely celebrated as a genius at the time, for "turning the corporate ship on a dime" to adapt to the new importance of the Internet. All he really did was to blend Explorer with IE, put ads on the Desktop, and generally try to make it look like windows was online. (The "Active" part of Active Desktop was that folder windows and the Desktop itself were techinaclly actually webpages. People were invited to stick something like a Disney ad to an area of the Desktop, where one could then presumably get the latest news and ticket prices for Disney's child exploitation extravaganzas.) By the time XP came out, Active Desktop was gone and instead of making Windows look like a browser they were trying out Fischer-Price style 3-D techno- kitsch "skins". The Internet was assumed by that time. They didn't need to train people that computers and Internet went together. On the other hand, the Internet has also become more integrated, as they did with the stupendously idiotic idea of searching online when you look for a file on your computer.
| I agree the probability is strong, but I have no ads on my Start Menu.
It's something they're euphemistically calling "suggestions". Supposedly it can be disabled, but by default it will advertise various things like software that you could buy, "from time to time". I gather that means that they're going to start slow.
| I can get my email on the Yahoo page and yes, it is loaded with ads. I | could not tell you what they are for as I ignore them. |
Well, at least you don't mind companies rifling through your email to show you targetted ads, so the privacy issues with Win10 probably won't bother you overly much. :)