Witnessing a moment of clarity

Jesus. Was it really three years ago that I first posted about Game Pass?

There are users for whom Game Pass is a good fit; heavy users who really will save money using the service, wealthy gamers for whom the cost of the service is essentially irrelevant, and ruthlessly opportunistic gamers who will pay for a single month only, and only when they "need" it, to play exactly one newly-released game and then cancel [...]

Game Pass is not a good deal; its value proposition is not, and never has been, "insane;" it is not a value option at all, really, except for people who semi-professionally play a wide variety of games, or people who may well have burgeoning video game addictions. So, be honest with yourself. 

Do you have a problem? Are video games taking over your life, in ways that are possibly self-destructive and unhealthy? If so, then you don't need Game Pass; you need help, and there's no shame in asking for that help.

For a long time, I thought I was alone, screaming my frustration into the void. Because the deal really was bad, but nobody else seemed to be willing to call it out for the anti-consumer nonsense it was. Even as every multimedia conglomerate on Earth launched their own subscriber-driven Contentᵀᴹ service, only to watch them all beat hasty retreats after those services lost boatloads of money, Game Pass was made of Teflonᵀᴹ. Nothing ever stuck; the narrative never evolved.

That is, until today. From Ethan Gach at Kotaku:

It’s Time To Start Killing Your Subscriptions

The prices are going up and you probably barely use them anyway

I feel so seen right now.

From the "what took you so long?" file...Seriously, The Verge, what took you so long?

Without further do, I give you this post from The Verge:

YouTube has been pissing me off for weeks. I’m starting to feel like I should pay $11.99 a month to subscribe to YouTube Premium just to get rid of the annoying pop-ups Google sends me almost daily. Google has decided to place pop-up ads in its own YouTube app for Premium subscriptions. This feels slightly acceptable at first, but Google has also decided these should spam you to death, sometimes full-screen, with no option to permanently dismiss them so you see them all the damn time.

It’s a classic growth hack designed to get more people to use YouTube Music or YouTube Premium because, honestly, who cares about either of those services? I already subscribe to Spotify, which is far superior to YouTube Music, and I’d never pay $11.99 just to have fewer YouTube ads and background playback of videos on my phone. It’s a pointless subscription that Google is trying to lazily ram down my throat instead of improving its offering, competing fairly with others, and, most importantly, focusing on its customer experience.

Google’s efforts here have made sure I, and I bet many others, will never touch YouTube Music or YouTube Premium. I absolutely loathe both of these services to the point where I’m left swearing at my phone like an idiot, simply because these stubborn ads keep appearing on top of the YouTube videos I’m trying to watch.

Where to start? How about with the fact that YouTube's mobile app hasn't been exhibiting this behaviour for mere weeks. YouTube has been pissing me off with this bullshit for months. Or with the fact that feeling like making users feel they "should pay $11.99 a month to subscribe to YouTube Premium just to get rid of the annoying pop-ups"is the entire fucking point of the pop-ups.

It just. Won't. Die!

Do you remember the Universal Windows Platform? The new paradigm for Windows software distribution, which Microsoft has been pushing since Windows 8, when it was called Metro, and which Windows users have been resoundingly rejecting ever since?

Metro, and Windows 8 with it, was so unpopular that Microsoft was forced to allow OEMs to install Windows 7 instead on machines whose purchasers were paying for Windows 8 licenses. Valve's Gabe Newell saw Microsoft's attempt to seize control over software distribution as so profoundly anti-competitive, and anti-consumer, that it birthed the Steam Machine initiative, whose SteamOS has since given rise to Steam Play/Proton, which is well on its way to making Windows irrelevant for gaming. And UWP-exclusive titles are virtually non-existent, since they can only be installed via Microsoft's storefront of desolation, while basically the entire PC gaming industry distributes their games through Steam.

That is the legacy of UWP for Microsoft: repeated failures, alienated consumers, and a well-deserved reputation for monopolistic bullshit. Well, apparently Microsoft still see UWP as their key to global domination, because it's baaaack!!!

Microsoft's Edge-ey move garners predictable responses

I'd already written about this development last week, but it looks like the rest of the tech media world has also caught on to Microsoft's latest move to force Edge on Windows 10 users, and the results are about what you'd expect.

Por ejemplo, Mashable:

Sorry Microsoft, but this isn't the way to get people to use your Edge browser

or diGit:

Microsoft could soon force Mail users to use Edge for email links in Windows 10

In the latest Preview Build, Microsoft is testing opening all Windows Mail links in Edge, even if the user's default browser is set to Chrome or Firefox.

or Übergizmo:

Windows 10 Mail Users Will Be Forced To Use Edge For Email Links

The Reg:

Windows 10 to force you to use Edge, even if it isn’t default browser

Grab some popcorn: Redmond’s asked for feedback on the idea

The Inquirer:

Microsoft is trying to bolster Edge in Windows 10 by overriding browser defaults

Firm has learned nothing about anti-competitive strong-arming 

Express.co.uk:

Windows 10 could FORCE you to use Microsoft Edge, even if Chrome is your default browser

MICROSOFT could soon force Windows 10 users to open links in Edge, regardless of users’ default web browser.

These are just the headlines, of course, but the story that they'e reporting hasn't changed since Friday, and the headlines show pretty clearly how badly Microsoft have failed at pitching their terrible idea. Almost every headline uses the word "force" to describe what MS are doing; none of them are even potentially positive. The Inquirer talks about "anti-competitive strong-arming" in their headline; The Reg is grabbing their popcorn as they watch this fireworks show kicking into high gear. It's difficult to say what reaction Microsoft were hoping for, here, but none of these reactions are good news for Redmond.

None of them are particularly insightful or informative, though. For those things, ladies and gentlemen, I give you Paul Thurrott.

MS tiptoes back from the "S Mode" edge

Well, colour me surprised if Microsoft didn't hear peoples' howls of outrage and walk back a terrible decision before it had even gone live.

From Thurrott.com:

Microsoft now says that it will no longer charge customers who wish to upgrade from Windows 10 in S mode. The revelation comes after a bizarre tweet in which Microsoft’s Joe Belfiore confirmed Thurrott.com’s exclusive story that it would kill Windows 10 S and provide S mode in all mainstream Windows 10 versions.

Now, Belfiore is providing more information and is doing so via a more traditional means: A Microsoft corporate blog.

“We’ve received feedback that the [Windows 10 S] naming was a bit confusing for both customers and partners,” he writes. “Based on that feedback, we are simplifying the experience for our customers. Starting with the next update to Windows 10, coming soon, customers can choose to buy a new Windows 10 Home or Windows 10 Pro PC with S mode enabled, and commercial customers will be able to deploy Windows 10 Enterprise with S mode enabled.”

[...]

Best of all, however, Belfiore now says that Microsoft will no longer try to charge customers to upgrade from S mode. (Today, the upgrade from Windows 10 S to Windows 10 Pro costs $50.) So you can upgrade from the hobbled S mode in Windows 10 Home, Pro, or Enterprise to the “full” version of whichever OS product edition for free going forward. This is absolutely the correct thing to do.

Microsoft's previous ruminations on their upcoming S Mode, its costs, and its lawsuit-avoidance carve-out for the antivirus software industry, were indeed bullshit, and S Mode is still bullshit, but at least Microsoft won't be charging gamers extra for wanting to install games on their new PCs anymore. So, yes, absolutely the correct thing to do, and it's only taken them three tries to produce an S Mode strategy that the market might actually accept.

Of course, this latest change also makes it even easier to ignore S Mode entirely, now that it's not being rammed down users' throats anymore, so it won't do anything to make S Mode relevant to consumers. Which means that S Mode is still a failure; Microsoft is just finally admitting failure, is all, rather than insisting on charging consumers extra to help cover their failure's costs.

It's tough to give Microsoft much credit, though, for belatedly doing something the less-shitty thing on their 3rd attempt, and only after the outcry made it clear that their anti-consumer bullshit would not fly. It's tough to even call this a win for consumers; Microsoft may have backed away from the edge this time, but there will be a next time, and a next one after that, so have we really won anything other than a temporary reprieve? Because it sure doesn't feel like a win.

I doubt that the overall goal, i.e. forcing consumers onto the Windows Microsoft Store to buy all of their PC software, has changed, however. With UWP failing, and Progressive Web Apps being a Google-led trend that Microsoft can't monopolize, it's tough to see how they'll be able to force the ecosystem issue, but mark my words: they will try again. Whether on some other ground, or on this same ground once it's swept clean, they will try again.

For now, though, saner heads appear to have prevailed. It's not much, but I'll still take it.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose...

Do you remember when Microsoft's vision for Windows 10 involved blocking normal program installation by default? When they had to make a big deal of the ability for users to enable "side loading," as if it was some sort of fucking gift that Microsoft were giving us out of the goodness of their hearts, rather than because Windows Store was a wasteland of shit that consumers wanted no part of?

They didn't stay backed down for long, though. It was only six months later that they were announcing Windows 10 S, a gimped version of the OS which didn't even allow the option of turning side-loading on unless you paid to upgrade from WX S to WX Pro. They ended up making upgrades free for the rest of 2017, because the Windows (later Microsoft) Store was still a wasteland of shit that consumers wanted no part of. Oh, and WX S was also unusably bad, because there were no apps for fucking thing.

Well, it turns out Microsoft still isn't done trying to force Windows users onto their horrible, horrible digital storefront for fucking everything, because they're trying yet again to do exactly that. Just, you know, not with people who've already switched over. No, it's only new WX users who'll get fucked.

From Tech Republic:

Windows 10: Get ready for more PCs that only run Microsoft Store apps by default

Microsoft is planning to update all versions of Windows 10 to incorporate S Mode, which will limit the machine to only installing apps from the Microsoft Store, according to a leaked roadmap.

Because of course they are. This has always been the plan.