Rodent Regatta

Brian Livingston keeps us up to date on Windows updates.

On its face, this isn’t so much a horrible change as it is an omen of Microsoft’s direction. Reader Walt Kwait sent me the next update message we’re likely to see: ”Click Yes, or No, or Cancel, or press Escape, or End Task, or just power off your PC to update your machine with any changes Microsoft wants to send you or take from you. Your birth alone was implied consent to Microsoft Corporation, allowing this to happen.”

And here’s another valuable insight:

Some observers criticized the comment of the Microsoft spokesman I quoted, who said that Windows Update is completely voluntary and that users aren’t required to run it. ”I can just imagine trying to get support from them if you do not have the latest patches installed,” David Rahn says. ”The first thing they usually say is, if you’re not running the latest patches, get there and then we’ll talk. Getting patches may be voluntary, but needing them certainly is not.”