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The Quiet Decision Microsoft Made That Devastated Thousands of Nonprofits (slate.com)
submitted 2 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] -3 points 2 months ago (6 children)

I'm all for consumer protection, but we're talking about a US-company that also made many of the dumbest decisions since win1.0. Come on, it's 2026, if anyone still does not get it why to avoid monopolies, especially those US-american, then who shall help those?

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  • [–] 4 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    Crushing majority of people have no idea. They just know MS is a big tech corp, so probably not caring much about them small fish. For the rest, all PC are Windows. Linux is getting known a little better but we're not "there" yet.

    Also, most small non-profit don't have an IT guy. They just try to get something that works painlessly and have better to do than becoming sys admins.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (4 children)

    You're right in all points. But still, knowledge is free and out there. MS is here for a long time now. And honestly, if I'm using things without knowing anything about them, who is to blame? Am I not simply ignorant?

    If I just walk into traffic, being ignorant of cars that might exist, and get run over. Would it be fair and square to protect ignorant me by prohibiting cars? Or that road?

    Consumer-protection is very important, and I'm a great advocate for it. But can't we just assume a tiny amount of reflection? We should protect people from e.g. connected cars, rising prices and whatnot. But If I'd hire a murderer from murder-r-us to mow my lawn, and he kills me. Is it really his fault? How could I have known?

    I think there's a certain threshold between not-having-to-know (e.g. relative prices on supermarket's price-tags for easy comparison) and should-be-obvious (e.g. monopolies are never a good thing and never have your interest at heart).

    have better to do than becoming sys admins.

    Exactly! That's why I go to a mechanic with my car and listen to his advice, as I have zero clue about how that car even works. And it's also obvious I don't install anything myself or just buy brand X because "everyone does". I ask professionals.i don't decide, I delegate.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

    That’s why I go to a mechanic with my car and listen to his advice, as I have zero clue about how that car even works.

    What happened to "knowledge is free and out there"?

    And honestly, if I’m using things without knowing anything about them, who is to blame? Am I not simply ignorant?

    People don't learn about linux for the same reason you don't learn about your car.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago

    What happened to "knowledge is free and out there"?

    Oh that's an absolutely free choice. Learn or dont. But you wouldn't hear me complaining for laws to protect me from an evil carmaker that made an evil car that I bought. I educate myself or just accept to potentially be fucked over.

    People don't learn about linux for the same reason you don't learn about your car.

    Yeah right, exactly. And when my car does something stupid, who is to blame? Me or the manufacturer? I clearly bought the stupid feature willingly. I'm not 12 anymore.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

    Professional help costs a money that these non-profit often don't have.
    Peers help is often also unhelpful and misleading. You can assume that among these non-profit using that service, a lot of them subscribed based on advices from other users.

    No you don't see people walking in the middle of the street oblivious to the traffic. But if "common knowledge" was cars never hit anyone, you would see people doing it.

    MS not only knows that, but they wanted that situation, making their products incompatible with their own standards in order to let people believe that "nothing else works correctly".

    Now they have it. They should be hold fully responsible for what they claimed, offered and therefore deleted.

    You don't blame victims of elaborate scams for being victims.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago

    Again, you're kinda right.

    You don’t blame victims of elaborate scams for being victims.

    No, of course not. But we're talking about MS here. A quasi-monopolistic company that exactly does what one would expect it to do. Exploit, change, modify, extort, whatever.

    Consumers need to be protected, but one could at least expect a minimum amount of responsibility for their actions. I hate Apple with all my heart, but there's actually an equally clicky-simply solution: Apple. The same shit, just even more walled and a tad more expensive. Or Ubuntu. Both simple, easy, colorful alternatives. Or stay with MS and use Libreoffice and store your shit LOCALLY goddamit, to remain adjacent to the article here.

    And If i were to spend my time on a non-profit (or anything else), I invest a tiny bit of research before choosing things. Time invested in research prior to decisions results in less time troubleshooting later. Especially(!) if we were talking about CLOUD-space where I store my stuff. And even more especially if that data is important.

    Sure, it'll be great if MS could get forced to, but my argument would still remain untouched.

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