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[EuroGamer] Woman awarded $10k after suing Microsoft for sneaky Windows 10 upgrade

6K views 99 replies 52 participants last post by  mcg75 
#1 ·
Source



Quote:
Microsoft has really been pushing its Windows 10 platform and for good reason. It has an Xbox App, DirectX 12 support, and other nifty gaming features. But it also has the terrifying HAL-like tendency to take over your machine whether you want it to or not. Many have been critical of Microsoft for strong-arming its upgrade on users and one woman even sued the mega corporation for this practice and came away with $10k.

As reported by the Seattle Times, Teri Goldstein's computer began installing the operating system without her knowledge and it had an adverse effect on her computer. This was especially egregious because she used that computer to run her travel-agency. Goldstein claimed that the machine slowed down so much that it was out of order for days.

"Nobody ever asked me if I wanted to update," said Goldstein, who claimed that prior to this incident she "had never heard of Windows 10."

So she took the Redmond-based giant to court in order to make up for lost wages and get a replacement computer. She won.

Microsoft dropped the appeal last month and awarded her with $10k.
 
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#3 ·
This is great news! M$ will have to change their practices or get smacked with a class action. I'm surprised they dropped the appeal as it is precedent setting.

buckle up for the lawsuit trolling train on the horizon!
 
#5 ·
MS dropped the appeal because $10K is barely a speck of dust in the bucket, and it would've cost them more to pay their legal team to appeal.

But yes it does set a nice precedence, and I hope they get hit with a barrage of class action suits.
 
#7 ·
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Now all we need is for enterprises to do the same!
 
#9 ·
from the SOURCE of the article:
Quote:
A few days after Microsoft released Windows 10 to the public last year, Teri Goldstein's computer started trying to download and install the new operating system.

The update, which she says she didn't authorize, failed. Instead, the computer she uses to run her Sausalito, Calif., travel-agency business slowed to a crawl. It would crash, she says, and be unusable for days at a time.

"I had never heard of Windows 10," Goldstein said. "Nobody ever asked me if I wanted to update."

When outreach to Microsoft's customer support didn't fix the issue, Goldstein took the software giant to court, seeking compensation for lost wages and the cost of a new computer.

She won. Last month, Microsoft dropped an appeal and Goldstein collected a $10,000 judgment from the company.

The company denies wrongdoing, and a spokeswoman said Microsoft halted its appeal to avoid the expense of further litigation.

Goldstein's experience is an extreme example of the consequences of Microsoft's aggressive campaign to get people to use Windows 10, the newest version of the ubiquitous personal-computer operating system.
MS's PR much be horrible if she didn't ever hear of W10.
tongue.gif
 
#10 ·
Good for her. Maybe more cases will appear now, as Microsoft's tactics affect people's lives daily. They did something good, at least there's that. If only they had changed GWX to be less of a malware program months ago, their public image wouldn't be so dented now.

Seems like common sense to not pre-check a new OS for install, no matter the Windows Update settings and likewise providing a choice on GWX to quit that nagware for good and deny the upgrade after being informed about the OS, but unfortunately it's 2016 and everything is upside down. The merit logic says that if the product is really good and even more - free - word of mouth will spread like wildfire and people will get out of their way in order to get it. But, alas, it's 2016 and the product is you.

Going back to the story, it may seem like a no-brainer for an informed enthusiast, but it's still time consuming to keep up to date and circle around Microsoft's tactics. Nowadays you have to be proficient and look up registry edits and / or policy editor changes and / or keep yourself informed about trustworthy third party utilities and / or hunt down which KB's to uninstall and keep at bay when they come back.

Now imagine how mind-boggling and completely unfair for regular, non IT minded users like this travel agency owner this is. Not everybody is a big corporation with 100+ seats and an IT department, small businesses around the world are a big part of the business fabric and shouldn't have to put up with Microsoft's cynical use of language and misleading user interface design.
 
#11 ·
Guess the lady in question never replied YES to the EULA or MS would have had her over a barrel. Or did it eat her computer before the EULA came up?

If she replied 'YES' to the EULA and then it ate her computer, then the court just over ruled the protection that MS expected the EULA would have afforded them. Now this would be seismic.

Expect a EULA change if the latter is the case. I have read that the latest EULA is what is in effect even if you said YES, I agree' to a previous one when you accepted the W10 upgrade.
 
#13 ·
Come to think of it, I just *might* be tempted to upgrade to Win 10 if Microsoft paid me $10K to do it.
biggrin.gif


and then I'd wait until the mandatory waiting period was over and revert back to Win7 immediately
 
#14 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by magnek View Post

Come to think of it, I just *might* be tempted to upgrade to Win 10 if Microsoft paid me $10K to do it.
biggrin.gif


and then I'd wait until the mandatory waiting period was over and revert back to Win7 immediately
I upgraded right away, with the safety net of knowing that I have the ability to revert any time I feel necessary through avenues that cannot be discussed here.

Is it great? Eh
Is it bad? I guess not

My only real issue is that at this point in time I still find basic stuff hard to find/change because it was pretty much the same for so long. On the flip side my pc does seem much more responsive, I appear to be the one holding it back
 
#15 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by charon View Post

Guess the lady in question never replied YES to the EULA or MS would have had her over a barrel. Or did it eat her computer before the EULA came up?

If she replied 'YES' to the EULA and then it ate her computer, then the court just over ruled the protection that MS expected the EULA would have afforded them. Now this would be seismic.

Expect a EULA change if the latter is the case. I have read that the latest EULA is what is in effect even if you said YES, I agree' to a previous one when you accepted the W10 upgrade.
There was a period of time that the Win 10 upgrade process would just start all on its own. I've seen it happen on a Win 7 box sitting about 3 feet from me. My GF for some reason has a hard time dealing with "new" things... I don't push her to upgrade the machine because there is an entirely new machine waiting for her if she wants to use 10.

I stopped the upgrade 3 times when it started happening for no reason... then one day when we were out of the room we came back to see the Win 10 upgrade in progress and I had to stop it. This was around when people started saying the X had been removed from the upgrade window... the X wasn't ever an issue here... it was the fact the upgrade would just suddenly start.

So at least in this case there was no accepting anything... EULA or otherwise... the machine would just suddenly get slow and start doing the Win 10 upgrade or.. as noted... you would walk out of the room and come back in to find it in progress. This stopped happening for us at least.

Personally I had another full price copy... that MS disabled after I used the key too many times changing out hardware. For Z170 I had 12 motherboards... and 6 cpu's. I only ever have one active at a time.. but I change hardware a lot and do clean installs. One day it was locked and their support told me I had used the key too many times. I explained that I have a full copy... not OEM and I'm supposed to be able to do what I am doing as long as I only have it active on the one computer (in other words I'm not activating this on 12 different motherboards at the same time... I am just changing out what is in the case and reinstalling). The outsourced support people told me that even with a retail copy I can't change hardware.... and there wasn't really any recourse beyond that.. so I lost a $200 full retail key I paid for... not every copy of Windows 10 was free...

I doubt I'm the only person they have pulled this on.. so I would expect more lawsuits of various kinds to follow in regards to Win 10. Of course now once your hardware is saved on their servers... you don't have to enter the key again to do a clean install... but this wasn't always the case and that's when I had the issue.. because I had to use the key to do a clean install.
 
#16 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by aweir View Post

One solution to this would be for Microsoft to make you enter one of those "I am not a robot" confirmation codes prior to updating, that way no one can lie and say Windows updated by itself, and Microsoft has the evidence to prove it.
Yeah, any sort of solid confirmation. Microsoft's windows 10 upgrade doesn't happen automatically, but it's pretty easy to accidentally upgrade without wanting to. Once you've told it you want to upgrade (accidentally) one will be scheduled, and make it look like it's doing it on it's own.
 
#18 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by charon View Post

Guess the lady in question never replied YES to the EULA or MS would have had her over a barrel. Or did it eat her computer before the EULA came up?

If she replied 'YES' to the EULA and then it ate her computer, then the court just over ruled the protection that MS expected the EULA would have afforded them. Now this would be seismic.

Expect a EULA change if the latter is the case. I have read that the latest EULA is what is in effect even if you said YES, I agree' to a previous one when you accepted the W10 upgrade.
The day an EULA overrides local and national laws is the day M$py can claim their EULA is worth anything.

Quote:
Originally Posted by aweir View Post

Quote:
Originally Posted by magnek View Post

Come to think of it, I just *might* be tempted to upgrade to Win 10 if Microsoft paid me $10K to do it.
biggrin.gif


and then I'd wait until the mandatory waiting period was over and revert back to Win7 immediately
I wonder if she's going back Windows XP 32 bit.
I'd rather have XP than Win Spy beta.
 
#20 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by tpi2007 View Post

Good for her. Maybe more cases will appear now, as Microsoft's tactics affect people's lives daily. They did something good, at least there's that. If only they had changed GWX to be less of a malware program months ago, their public image wouldn't be so dented now.

Seems like common sense to not pre-check a new OS for install, no matter the Windows Update settings and likewise providing a choice on GWX to quit that nagware for good and deny the upgrade after being informed about the OS, but unfortunately it's 2016 and everything is upside down. The merit logic says that if the product is really good and even more - free - word of mouth will spread like wildfire and people will get out of their way in order to get it. But, alas, it's 2016 and the product is you.

Going back to the story, it may seem like a no-brainer for an informed enthusiast, but it's still time consuming to keep up to date and circle around Microsoft's tactics. Nowadays you have to be proficient and look up registry edits and / or policy editor changes and / or keep yourself informed about trustworthy third party utilities and / or hunt down which KB's to uninstall and keep at bay when they come back.

Now imagine how mind-boggling and completely unfair for regular, non IT minded users like this travel agency owner this is. Not everybody is a big corporation with 100+ seats and an IT department, small businesses around the world are a big part of the business fabric and shouldn't have to put up with Microsoft's cynical use of language and misleading user interface design.
But remember, she should have just spent the time to learn about how to control Windows update and actually given a crap about Windows in general so MS is free to push their new OS' however they wish!
rolleyes.gif

Quote:
Originally Posted by charon View Post

Guess the lady in question never replied YES to the EULA or MS would have had her over a barrel. Or did it eat her computer before the EULA came up?

If she replied 'YES' to the EULA and then it ate her computer, then the court just over ruled the protection that MS expected the EULA would have afforded them. Now this would be seismic.

Expect a EULA change if the latter is the case. I have read that the latest EULA is what is in effect even if you said YES, I agree' to a previous one when you accepted the W10 upgrade.
EULAs aren't a be all, end all. I believe if you've broken one so long as you haven't actually broken the law or harmed the company with your actions, the most the company can do is refuse to support the product for you/revoke your license/whatever terms you have with them. (Not 100% sure on that, however..)
Quote:
Originally Posted by tkenietz View Post

I upgraded right away, with the safety net of knowing that I have the ability to revert any time I feel necessary through avenues that cannot be discussed here.

Is it great? Eh
Is it bad? I guess not

My only real issue is that at this point in time I still find basic stuff hard to find/change because it was pretty much the same for so long. On the flip side my pc does seem much more responsive, I appear to be the one holding it back
The increased responsiveness is usually the case when upgrading/reinstalling Windows. New ones feel faster OOTB because they have more up to date drivers, too. I've seen this with Vista versus XP, 7 versus Vista and 8/8.1 versus 7...When you updated all drivers they'd be pretty similar in performance in most metrics. (Exceptions being Vista would have lower FPS than XP, but felt more fluid and 8/8.1 switched how the shut down worked to be much faster.)
 
#21 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Liranan View Post

The day an EULA overrides local and national laws is the day M$py can claim their EULA is worth anything.
I'd rather have XP than Win Spy beta.
O boy...that didnt take long.
 
#23 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Brutuz View Post

But remember, she should have just spent the time to learn about how to control Windows update and actually given a crap about Windows in general so MS is free to push their new OS' however they wish!
rolleyes.gif
Yep, I forgot about that one, the "super caveat emptor otherwise corporate bullcrap is not only expected, but somehow perfectly legitimized".
 
#24 ·
The precedent this sets for microsoft is scary....
 
#25 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by magnek View Post

MS dropped the appeal because $10K is barely a speck of dust in the bucket, and it would've cost them more to pay their legal team to appeal.

But yes it does set a nice precedence, and I hope they get hit with a barrage of class action suits.
Then that poor criminal would have had to deal with Windows 10.
 
#26 ·
I like that swapping the OS required a replacement computer. Keep forgetting that an operating system completely changes the computer in irreversible ways.

With any luck in one month this will just be a memory and the free upgrade period will expire.
 
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