This is Microsoft’s latest annoying addition to Windows.
After leaving Windows I actually still get stressed just reading about stuff like this.
Why do you think you need to download Chrome? Write a 500 word essay explaining how it’s better than Edge.
(For real, though, it’s not. Use Firefox.)
So there’s also this neat feature in Microsoft Office where if you insert a hyperlink to a Google Doc/Sheets/Slides/Forms, Microsoft appends URIs to the end that prevents the link from opening in browsers other than Edge/IE. It can be corrected with a registry edit, but it’s been an issue for years and years at this point. Super annoying!
Or another fun thing I recently saw at work, Microsoft changing Office programs to always open links in Edge by default so you have to edit a setting to make it open the default browser again - which caused a significant productivity loss when people suddenly had various intranet pages opened in a browser they were not logged into, and they all had to contact support to get the original sane behavior back.
Microsoft is being run by marketing teams with hubris these days, there’s absolutely no way they’re testing these things with real humans before release.
but the OS remains hostile against user choice.
That’s just it. Most of us probably work on our computers – imagine if you were a carpenter and your tools actively fought you. It’s about literal quality of life for me at this point.
The worst part is that if Raymond Chen is to be believed (author of The Old New Thing, work(ed) for Microsoft) this is the complete antithesis of what their philosophy was supposed to be in the Windows 96/98 era, which was “let the user have full control over how they want to use their computer.”
That shit went right out the window, didn’t it?
Why use Windows at that point?
My machine still has Windows 10, and ir can’t upgrade to Windows 11. The day they stop supporting Windows 10 is the day I’ll stop using Windows for good.
Kinda sad. I used to like to hate Windows, but I always knew that I could personally use it if needed. But ads? Telemetry? Non-uninstallable software again? They crossed a line.
Personally I hate these tools with a passion as every single one I’ve seen goes overboard and disables potentially wanted features or straight up breaks stuff in its default configuration. It’s always fun to figure out what’s wrong with a machine only to eventually figure out that the owner used one of those tools a few months ago.
IMO people should either do these changes themselves or use another OS, though ultimately there needs to be legislation against this to help the non-technical people.
If you have to do stuff like that, it’s time the cut your losses and stop using windows.
So my conclusion is, you can’t disbale anything unless Microsoft allows you to, yes you can have a less annoying experience with one of the tools I mentioned above, but the OS remains hostile against user choice.
Whats funny there, is people that are forced (I assume that’s the only reason you’d run it) to run Windows hate that shit, while at the same time the Apple cult embraces have zero control of their devices. They know best after all…
