This is great, but similar to Brexit, is counterproductive. Nowadays is a matter of proudness to be an ignorant asshole. I honestly don't know how to counter that argument, I don't think you can, and unfortunately I predict Trump is going to win.

It's impotant to remember that most of the terrorist had Belgian passports and been living in Belgium almost all their lives, it has nothing to do with the refugees from Syria.

I've been a user for a while, I still don't know at what step they changed the default domain .ch to .com; At the time it was a big deal because in theory the US government couldn't request easily access to a foreign server. was a fan of the early stage, I dislike the new inbox redesign.

On a day like today, rainy and a bit cold, a Straffe Hendrik.

I want to get into homebrewing, how does a very warm and humid climate affects a brew?

I read the trilogy almost 20 years ago. I borrowed it to who later would be my boss, after a several hour conversation about the book during a road trip. We never talked about it afterwards and he never asked about the 2 other books. I enjoyed it, back when I used to spend a lot of money on books.

Microsoft MSFT -1.89% has been on a roll lately. Its massive Windows 10 update ‘Threshold 2’ has far more good features than bad ones, the ‘free upgrade’ rules have been improved and even Microsoft’s Black Friday 2015 deals are surprisingly great. But a new discovery has been made which isn’t good news – at all…

Earlier this month Microsoft finally went on record admitting that automatic spying within Windows 10 cannot be stopped. This sparked a lot of outrage and with ‘Threshold 2’ it appeared Microsoft had done a sharp U-turn because the background service at the heart tracking (the ‘Diagnostics Tracking Service’ aka ‘DiagTrack’) appeared to have been removed. Critics celebrated and it was another well deserved pat on the back for Microsoft.

Except it turns out Microsoft had just been very sneaky. What Tweakhound discovered and was subsequently confirmed by BetaNews, is Microsoft simply renamed DiagTrack. It is now called the ‘Connected User Experiences and Telemetry Service’ – which is both a) deliberately vague, and b) misleading (don’t ‘Connected User Experiences’ sound great).

Even sneakier is, in being renamed, Microsoft also reset users preferences. Those who dug deep into the Windows 10 registry to disable DiagTrack will find it has been re-enabled now it is called the Connected User Experiences and Telemetry Service. Yes, tracking is back and without any warning and your preferences were irrelevant.

The good news is you can disable the Connected User Experiences and Telemetry Service the same way as DiagTrack:

Hold down the Windows key and tap the R key

In the box that opens type ‘services.msc’ and press the Enter key

In the ‘Services (Local)’ section locate ‘Connected User Experiences and Telemetry’ and double-click it

In the ‘Service status’ section click ‘Stop’

Under the ‘Startup type’ drop down menu select ‘Disabled’ and then confirm this and close the window by clicking ‘OK’

Note: it is advisable to disable Not delete the service. Deleting it can cause problems

Windows 10 prior to the Threshold 2 update shows 'Connected User Experiences And Telemetry'. Image credit: Tweakhound

Windows 10 prior to the Threshold 2 update shows ‘Connected User Experiences And Telemetry’ which executes the exact same service as DiagTrack. Image credit: Tweakhound

So what is Microsoft thinking here? I’ve reached out to the company but, despite recognising my enquiry, it has yet to issue a statement. I’ll update this post when it does.

While Microsoft thinks about what to say, I’d say the problem with the DiagTrack rebrand is the company wasn’t thinking. Subtle under the hood changes will always be picked up for such a high profile product. That said such a move is consistent with the negatives in Threshold 2 namely: it resets many user preferences (including basics like your preferred web browser) if they weren’t Microsoft product/services as well as silently deleting third party system monitoring apps like: CPU-Z, speccy, 8gadgetpack, SpyBot, HWMonitor and more.

In my opinion it is this kind of overriding desire for control and a disregard for user choices which is harming Windows 10. At its core Windows 10 is a modern and highly capable platform, but it has been buried under ludicrous layers of control. Worst still it has created a two tier customer base where consumers are forced to take updates which businesses can delay, effectively turning everyday users into bug testers for corporations.

It all feels unsavoury and unnecessary and (while it could be coincidence) there has been a dramatic slowdown in Windows 10 growth after an explosive beginning. For the first ever Free version of Windows, that’s not great.

How can Microsoft reignite the love for Windows 10? I’d say a good start would be to stop doing daft things like this…

The billion dollar is true. Soros and the break of the Bank of England in 1992.

The idea sounds great, proper implementation makes for a great source of information.

This reminds me of a very old joke/hoax going on in some parts of Europe regarding frivolous lawsuits and human stupidity. The owner of a recently purchased RV set the cruise control while on the highway and went to the back the RV to pick up something while he left the cruise control in control. Of course he crashed and then proceeded to suit the manufacturer of the RV for false advertising and damages.

Here we are 30 years later with reality surpassing fiction.

There is indeed a difference and thank you for the work.

Yes, there is indeed a difference, some weeks there is no spam at all.

There are accounts now 20 days old that are spamming, and using tags that perhaps would be useful in the future.