Re: Bypassing host file
"The author of this hosts file evidently thinks you can use it to confound the Windows 10 reporting. The post that started this thread believes Windows is bypassing the hosts file. Does anyone know which it is?"
I've seen no convincing evidence anywhere that Windows 10 bypasses the hosts file. I've also seen no evidence that it continues to take data if you tell it not to.
Really, I'm not keen on the data slurping either, but some of the claims going round about Win 10 are beyond hysteria. Were reaching the point where people will swear blind that just looking at someone else's Win 10 machine will immediately result in the NSA putting you on a watch list, which (considering MS are still paying a huge daily fine for refusing to release the data stored in Ireland) is a bit of a disservice to one of the few tech giants who have refused to hand over data to us.gov without a warrant.
And yes, dan1980 more or less has the right of it - MS has spent most of the last decade trying to be Apple. They used to revel in being the software company that everyone hated but no-one could live without, but since Gates stood down MS appears to have become pathetically desperate for a hug and wanting someone, ANYONE to like them. To stop being the big bad wolf which everyone else can set themselves up against and appear to be the good guys, even when they're a privacy-destroying monster like Google.
That's also what makes the Maxipad so disturbing - it's Apple trying to be Microsoft rather than the other way round for the first time in at least ten years, and another example of Tim Cook's losing battle to find originality. Rather than MS seeing some trendy new bit of Apple kit and producing a decent copy that no-one wants (iPod=Zune, iPhone = Lumia, iPad=Surface RT), instead suddenly Apple are trying to rip off the Surface 3. And why? Who the hell wants to be Microsoft?
Biting the hand that feeds IT
