News: 0175369343

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Microsoft Delays Recall Again (theverge.com)

(Thursday October 31, 2024 @06:40PM (msmash) from the tough-luck dept.)


Microsoft is once again [1]delaying the roll out of its controversial Recall feature for Copilot Plus PCs. From a report:

> The software giant had planned to start testing Recall, which creates screenshots of mostly everything you see or do on a Copilot Plus PC, with Windows Insiders in October. Now, Microsoft says it needs more time to get the feature ready.

>

> "We are committed to delivering a secure and trusted experience with Recall. To ensure we deliver on these important updates, we're taking additional time to refine the experience before previewing it with Windows Insiders," says Brandon LeBlanc, senior product manager of Windows, in a statement to The Verge. "Originally planned for October, Recall will now be available for preview with Windows Insiders on Copilot Plus PCs by December."



[1] https://www.theverge.com/2024/10/31/24284572/microsoft-recall-delay-december-windows-insider-testing



Nobody wants this thing...nobody (Score:5, Informative)

by MatthiasF ( 1853064 )

And yet they continue to try to push it, like it's so important for them to screenscrap all of us and record our lives.

I don't even understand the argument from the management side. Like, this is a security risk in their own production environment, why would they think it's a good idea in a broader environment.

Re: Nobody wants this thing...nobody (Score:5, Informative)

by paul_engr ( 6280294 )

Yes. Nobody wants this fucking shit. Do you? Didn't think so, asshole.

Re: (Score:2)

by ArchieBunker ( 132337 )

This guy does. [1]https://tech.slashdot.org/comm... [slashdot.org]

[1] https://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=23331799&cid=64492235

Re: (Score:2)

by narcc ( 412956 )

You shouldn't pick on people with special needs.

Re: (Score:2)

by Darinbob ( 1142669 )

I agree with his idea that Windows search sucks. However this Recall won't improve the search and is most likely just going to make the sucking sound even louder.

Re: (Score:2)

by ArchieBunker ( 132337 )

First thing I install on any Windows box [1]https://www.voidtools.com/ [voidtools.com]

[1] https://www.voidtools.com/

Re: (Score:1)

by guruevi ( 827432 )

The feature of converting any image into copy-pasteable text has been in Mac for a while now (anything that uses Preview/native PDF rendering). Adobe (Acrobat Pro) has it as well to a more limited extent. It is definitely useful. I'm not sure how useful scrolling back into time with your windows is, but recovering accidentally closed windows is useful to an extent (command-shift-t on browsers for example), and native, continuous versioning of files as is the case on Mac is also useful.

This is Microsoft's po

Re:Nobody wants this thing...nobody (Score:5, Insightful)

by gweihir ( 88907 )

The "argument" is simply that they have wasted countless billions on "AI" and there is still no credible application. Hence they push this thing. Probably a few careers tied to it or they would have stopped on the first wave of backlash.

Re: (Score:3)

by fatwilbur ( 1098563 )

Meh, "billions" when it relates to the big tech companies these days doesn't mean what it used to. Microsoft has invested, what, $13 billion into OpenAI? As of today MS is worth a shade over $3 trillion, which if you forget is $3,000 billion. They could simply issue new common stock and sell it in 10 minutes to cover that investment and it wouldn't even show as a blip in their stock price. They can (and do) afford to through "billions" around on many different prospects, and I doubt they'll let just one of

Re: (Score:2)

by sanf780 ( 4055211 )

More likely, how to get buy in for the NPUs that have begun to appear on desktop CPUs. Once it is in HW, it is hard to take it out.

Re: (Score:2)

by sarren1901 ( 5415506 )

I agree with you but for the sake of discussion, I'll play devil's advocate.

From a management perspective, assuming (big assumption here) all the scrapped training data is kept on-premise then I could see this as a way to automate some of the more mundane tasks done by some of the lower level, input only employees. If the workflow is consistent, you could then use co-pilot to automate these portions of the job away.

If you have multiple data-input employees, you could, in theory, reduce your headcount while

Re: (Score:2)

by thedarb ( 181754 )

There's an idiot trying to replicate this for Linux. Self hosted, but still. All that data would be one hack away from being on the internet.

Bothers me that any Linux minded individual would think this is a good idea.

Bad idea is bad idea... (Score:3)

by gweihir ( 88907 )

At least MS marketing should know by now. There is no actual effective intelligence present in any other parts of Microsoft, but marketing is what kept them afloat until now.

Easy fix (Score:5, Interesting)

by paul_engr ( 6280294 )

Cancel recall and unemploy all of the decision makers behind such a garbage ass idea. Then allocate some people to fix the fucking settings menu, but not the assholes that broke it with win10 in the first place.

Re: (Score:3)

by gweihir ( 88907 )

That would be rational and a good idea. MS does not do those.

Another Bizspeak Translation (Score:3)

by Miles_O'Toole ( 5152533 )

""We are committed to delivering a secure and trusted experience with Recall."

If they actually meant what they said, they wouldn't be "committed to delivering"...they would promise to deliver.

co-pilot (Score:2)

by Growlley ( 6732614 )

disable recall then turn yourself off.

Re: (Score:2)

by PPH ( 736903 )

> disable recall

I wonder how long it will be until web sites and applications sniff out the disabled status of Recall and refuse to run with a snotty popup to that effect.

Re: (Score:2)

by dslbrian ( 318993 )

Chris Titus had an interesting video where he was looking into the dependency ties of Recall. In a couple videos preceding the one below he found that removing Recall would break File Explorer. This was found to be due to bad dependency setup, but the strange thing is the feature is not fully present, but is being shipped as enabled. This has the look of shipping it opt-out even though it was previously said it would be opt-in only.

I fully expect this will just pop into existance at some point the same

Re: (Score:2)

by PPH ( 736903 )

> dependency ties of Recall

Sounds like the old "We can't delete IE. That would break Windows." But with a few more decades to refine their pitch.

Re: (Score:2)

by narcc ( 412956 )

That is extremely unlikely, for many, many, reasons. What on earth makes you think this is even a remote possibility?

Gonna hafta recall Recall (Score:2)

by Tablizer ( 95088 )

That's going to make for confusing notices. The hook will ring off the phone.

Roger Murdock: "We have clearance, Clarence."

Captain Oveur: "Roger, Roger. What's our vector, Victor? One moment, we have a recall on Recall..."

(swiped from 'Airplane!' movie)

and you can call me Shirley, it's Halloween.

Ready by December (Score:2)

by PPH ( 736903 )

Satya is coming to town

He sees you when you're sleeping

He knows when you're awake

He knows if you've been bad or good

So be good for goodness sake

Turns out his ex-wife uses Linux (Score:2)

by ebunga ( 95613 )

He'll have to stalk her some other way.

This was the straw (Score:1)

by Anonymous Coward

I know a couple of people who switched off of Windows entirely because of recall.

recall (Score:1)

by gary s ( 5206985 )

As long as it has a disable button. they can put it in whenever they like.

Re: (Score:2)

by Cpt_Kirks ( 37296 )

It will reenable during the thrice weekly "updates".

Re: (Score:2)

by Baron_Yam ( 643147 )

Every mouse click will result in a pop-up asking if you want to enable it until you just cave in frustration.

GDPR compliance (Score:1)

by PeteFox ( 3660371 )

So in Europe we have GDPR laws that say if a person you have data on requests it you have to put there data beyond processing. So delete it from your CRM system or what ever systems youâ(TM)re tracking them in. Iâ(TM)m curious if recall has a snapshot of the customer record when you looked at in your browser how is this meant to be centrally found and deleted. I donâ(TM)t see how this thing can be GDPR compliant. The whole concept of keep everything searchable for all time is essentially il

Re: (Score:2)

by ebunga ( 95613 )

Since when has Microsoft cared about staying within the confines of the law?

Who Wants This? (Score:1)

by Farley1 ( 10486868 )

Who wants Microsoft spyware installed on their PCs? Corporate? Nope. Consumers? Nope. Chinese Spies? Why not.

Wonderful feature (Score:1)

by rickkw ( 920898 )

Dear Microsoft, I applaud you for such an innovation. Unfortunately, the world does not appreciate your brilliance. The best way to convince the unconverted is to show the world that the Recall feature is turned on for all Microsoft employees and executives in office and at home, especially CEO Satya. This will show us how useful this AI innovation changes our lives. This practice is commonly referred to eating your own dog food. But of course, this is no dog food. You will love it.

Once upon a time there was a DOS user who saw Unix, and saw that it was
good. After typing cp on his DOS machine at home, he downloaded GNU's
unix tools ported to DOS and installed them. He rm'd, cp'd, and mv'd
happily for many days, and upon finding elvis, he vi'd and was happy. After
a long day at work (on a Unix box) he came home, started editing a file,
and couldn't figure out why he couldn't suspend vi (w/ ctrl-z) to do
a compile.
(By ewt@tipper.oit.unc.edu (Erik Troan)