If you want to skip the waiting line to force the Windows 10 upgrade from 7 or 8 today, follow this link and click the buttons. I did this successfully on both a laptop that runs Windows 7, and one that runs Windows 8.
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Memory Bucket
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Disabling Windows 10’s Built-in Spyware and P2P Update Sharing
Windows 10‘s privacy settings very much need to be frowned at. Essentially: unless you pay close attention to the fluffy options offered when you first install Microsoft’s new operating system, it’s going to quietly track your behaviour and use it to fire targeted ads at you, as well as keeping tabs on your location history, data from messages, calendars, contacts and God knows what else. It is a bit scary, despite coming off the back of Microsoft’s own pledge to offer ‘real transparency’. You may or may not be OK with this yourself, but in any event at least some of this stuff can be turned off after the fact. I’ll explain how to do that below.
There’s a whole list of things you may want to do in Alec’s article. I disagree with his suggestion to stop using a Microsoft account for login, it’s a great feature that certain settings are shared between my laptop and desktop Windows installations, Cortana is similarly useful, but everything else is sound.
Additionally, the peer-to-peer sharing of Windows updates is gross just like the Blizzard updater and should be disabled.
To disable p2p sharing of Windows updates, do this:
- Go to the Settings program from the start menu:
- Click Update & security on this screen:
- Click Advanced Options:
- Click Choose how updates are delivered:
- Click the first toggle option and set it to off:
Now your computer won’t share updates with others.
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Playstation 4 Cloud Saves Are Terrible
In the comparison between PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, Sony is about as behind in how they handle cloud saves as they are in getting their console to run Halo. It’s time for them to close this gap.
The difference is dramatic. While both systems allow users to save game progress to a set of external servers called the cloud, making it easier to resume games on a second console, Microsoft does it in a free, automatic and seemingly unlimited way. Sony does it in an expensive, laborious and stingy way.
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Goodbye, Android
Rightfully scathing article from Vice’s Motherboard’s Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai:
I’ve been antagonistic with Apple products ever since I was a teenager, when Apple used to try to shove its apps down my throat (cough iTunes cough) whenever I just wanted to watch a movie trailer on Quicktime. I never liked Apple’s walled garden and “we-control-everything” approach, and I particularly disliked Apple fanboys’ dumb “oh my god there’s a new iThing coming out” reverence and hysteria.
So when the original iPhone came out a few years ago, I swore in multiple heated discussions with friends and strangers that I’d never buy an iPhone. Since then, I’ve only owned Android phones. First a few HTC ones, now a Sony phone.
Well, I’m sick of it. And I’m ready to go to the dark side.
I love the Android users in the comments chiming in that rooting a device and installing a custom ROM is a reasonable thing to do for Android devices that receive no updates from their carriers and manufacturers.
The ability for devices to receive updates in a timely fashion is critical to having even the vaguest hint of security in our post-Snowden revelations world. Windows 10‘s silent update mechanism is a great step in that direction for end-user security. Google even does it for their Chrome browser. Everybody else needs to get on board with it.