Microsoft’s aggressive Windows 10 push has been nothing but controversial, with the update currently set to automatically install as a Recommended Update if your PC is set up like that.
Complaints regarding unexpected updates to Windows 10 has been a regular occurence, and now the owner of a California travel-agency has won $10,000 from Microsoft in a court case following just such a case, which may now open the flood gates for other claims.
Teri Goldstein was in the first wave of users updating to the operating system last year.
“I had never heard of Windows 10,” Goldstein said. “Nobody ever asked me if I wanted to update.”
The update failed, and Teri reports that since then her computer, which she uses to run her business, has slowed to a crawl, would crash and would be unusable for days.
When Microsoft’s customer support could not fix the issue, Goldstein took Microsoft to court, seeking compensation for lost wages and the cost of a new computer.
She won the case and last month Microsoft dropped an appeal and Goldstein collected a $10,000 judgment from the company.
Microsoft however still denies wrongdoing, and a spokeswoman said Microsoft halted its appeal to avoid the expense of further litigation.
Microsoft says it offers users a choice to update, not a requirement. People have to acknowledge a dialogue box before the installation, and agree to a license agreement afterward, to receive Windows 10, the company says.
Those who don’t like the new software have 31 days afterward to roll back to their previous version, the company says, and free customer support is available to those who run into trouble.
Other Windows users disagree.
“They tell you it’s optional, that you have to opt in, but they just do it anyway,” said Jane Dunkin, a human-resources assistant in Astoria, Ore.
Griffin Tyndall, a lawyer in Birmingham, Ala., had dismissed prompts to get Windows 10 for months but still one day woke up to find both his home and business computers welcoming him to Windows 10.
He rolled back both computers to Windows 7 without incident.
“I can’t afford to have anything happen to my computers. I guess I’m fortunate that nothing did,” he said. “I appreciate the ability to have automatic (security) updates, but changing the whole operating system? No, I did not want that done.”
“It’s kind of bold for them to just automatically do that as part of their updates,” he added.
In some ways it seems unlikely that a rolled-back update would cause the issues that Teri complained about, but Microsoft has lost the trust of users with its aggressive update push, which may cause further issues down the line when users turn of automatic updates.
Wes Miller, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft who once worked for Microsoft building the Windows Update service, said some Windows users were pre-emptively turning off all updates in an effort to avoid Windows 10.
“My worry with this is that they are fundamentally manipulating the trust Windows consumers will have in Windows Update from this point going forward,” Miller said. “You can’t perform an action for a user without their explicit permission, it’s just not acceptable.”
Fortunately the Windows 10 free update push is set to expire in about 30 days but much of the damage may already have been done.
Do our readers think Microsoft has gone too far, or are Luddites simply standing in the way of progress? Let us know below.
Travel agent wins $10,000 from Microsoft after failed Windows 10 upgrade
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