zlacker

Ok I’ll take the contrarian view. Why is it a big deal that a specialized url scheme is specifically intended to launch a Microsoft browser? Only apps built by Microsoft will use that scheme.

>>danjc+(OP)
As far as privacy is concerned, there's not much difference between using someone's browser and inviting them into you home. Imagine two people show up at your door. One is your trusted friend. The other is your landlord's friend, and you don't trust them.

Would it be a big deal for your landlord to push his friend in the door when you try to let your friend in? After all, he owns the home (you just pay for a license to use it), and he trusts his friend, so why should you care?

>>danjc+(OP)
Because Microsoft makes Windows, and therefore can force anything Windows tries to open to use that scheme. This means you can never view search results, weather, news, etc. that Windows provides to you integrated into its experience in any browser other than edge.

>>danjc+(OP)
You go to your system settings, and set your "default Web browser".

You use any feature of the OS that would open a Web page, like Start menu searches, "help" links (that nowadays are just links to Bing searches, another shitshow I won't get into), or dynamic wallpaper info bites.

The system says "fuck you" and opens the browser that is more convenient to their economic goals rather than your explicit choice.

Is it illegal? Thank god no. Is it subversive and a complete dick move? Definitely.

>>krolta+v7
Why shouldn't it be illegal?

>>Thiez+Au
They thanked god, so probably another poor understanding of mythology.

>>ivraat+q4
But they don’t. Microsoft could do this. Apple could do that. Google could do this and that. I don’t give much of a shit what someone could do. Biden could order a nuclear attack on Finland. China could order all references to their president baseball be replaced by the word baseball. Linus could merge in whatever the fuck to the kernel. But if he did, everyone would panic, so let’s wait until they do the thing

>>deusum+Gs1
I'm actually agnostic, and used the expression in the secular figurative sense.

>>Thiez+Au
Do we really need legislation that digs so deep in the implementation details of computers?

I would think at most something along "systems should respect user preferences where available", but definitely not "systems should never override a user preference", since there are valid cases for the latter.

>>Praeto+i72
What are you talking about? They are literally doing this right now, that's already what it is doing. Everything I described is happening now.

>>ivraat+Ds7
Because it’s hyperbole. Not in the sense of it not being literally true, but hyperbolic in the sense that it is both an avoidable and limited to first party properties. It’s also not abusing existing standards. Instead of redirecting all browser links through Edge, they made a handler that specifies Edge. Firefox decided that it would ignore this design and hijack links that are specified to use Edge.

Let me give you a real example. Microsoft has a link to manage your Microsoft account online. This opens in Edge and thus can auto-login to your account. That is the expected and secure behavior. Firefox shouldn’t be able to hijack that.

Also you can still use any browser to check the weather. Just not via the integrated windows app.