Here's to Windows Report, still lowering the journalistic bar by carrying water for Microsoft:
The tech giant recently lost a Windows 10 upgrade lawsuit and had to pay $10,000 in damages after its upgrade tricks caused a businesswoman to almost lose her business.
NY Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and his team are actively investigating a new Windows 10 forced upgrade case and are gathering evidence and user complaints against Microsoft’s unfair upgrade tactics. The lawmen have been helped by the Rockland County Times newspaper, which forwarded them a series of Windows 10 upgrade complaints.
NY state is not the only state actively investigating user accusations against Microsoft’s Windows 10 upgrade methods as other states are also beginning to actively pursue cases against Microsoft on their residents’ behalf.
This wave of lawsuits against Microsoft has even convinced some of the company’s fans to conclude that these events are being orchestrated by Microsoft’s competition. Google has never hidden its intention of stealing 80% of Microsoft’s business client pool, and many Windows users fear the search engine giant has recently raised the stakes.You've got to be fucking kidding me.
Inconvenient as it may be for Microsoft, their growing legal troubles are nobody's fault except their own. They lost that $10,000 lawsuit because a California court found them to be in the wrong, and ordered them to pay damages. They may not want to admit wrongdoing, but that only matters when settling a lawsuit before a judgment is handed down; once the court orders the payment of damages, the wrongdoing is no longer a question, it's a legal fact.
The same applies in New York, where the Attorney General reportedly has enough complaints on file, and evidence showing wrongdoing in enough of them, that a lawsuit makes legal sense. That's only possible because of Microsoft's shady doings over a period of most of a year. Google didn't mind control Satya Nadella and make him lead his company down this sketchy, dodgy path. This is an entirely unforced error; Microsoft have done this to themselves.
That doesn't mean that Google won't take advantage; in fact, they should be taking advantage. When an opponent makes a huge, unforced error, handing you an enormous opportunity the process, it's business malpractice to do anything but take advantage. Google would be doing a disservice to their own shareholders if they let this go by without trying to capitalize. But that doesn't make Microsoft's legal woes somehow Google's fault; there's no orchestration required here. All that's needed is time, allowing slow-to-react regulators and other public officials to catch up with Microsoft's anti-competitive, anti-consumer reality.
We're only seeing the tip of the iceberg, here. It won't surprise me at all if Microsoft end up facing another antitrust action over #upgradegate. But have no illusions: Microsoft have more than earned every bit of this legal scrutiny.