Microsoft Motherf*ckers

June 9, 2010 3:37 PM

Did you install a Windows patch Tuesday? Listen, and understand. That mystery update is in there. It can't be uninstalled. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are assimilated.
posted by pjern (55 comments total)

Oh god somebody got Microsoft stuff in my Windows OS >:-|
posted by turgid dahlia at 3:41 PM on June 9, 2010

You seem angry. Are you angry?
posted by monju_bosatsu at 3:42 PM on June 9, 2010

It seems like it's just an update for their toolbar. The problem is they don't check whether you've disabled the toolbar or not. Anyway what does Gawker say about this?
posted by bhnyc at 3:45 PM on June 9, 2010

This is clearly the work of that Fifth Column that Rob Enderle warned us about.
posted by entropicamericana at 3:45 PM on June 9, 2010

The problem isn't this update.

The problem is that there are people who still consider IE a viable browser. Compounding the problem is that there are people who think IE is a viable browser and that adding additional toolbars to IE will somehow make it an even more viable browser.
posted by JaredSeth at 3:47 PM on June 9, 2010 [8 favorites]

The problem is that there are people who still consider IE a viable browser.

IE8 is a pretty decent browser, and IE9 has an impressive demo, although we'll see where that leads. I'm not convinced IE is "not viable". (I'm a Chrome user, but I end up using all the browsers for testing purposes and find IE8 decent. It's also the best browser for running Flash in, at least in terms of performance -- although sandboxing is nice when Flash misbehaves).
posted by wildcrdj at 3:49 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

Good times.

I mean, goodtimes.
posted by GuyZero at 3:50 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

"The problem is that there are people who still consider IE a viable browser. "

Most, in fact.
posted by bz at 3:50 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

"How do you think I feel? Betrayed, bewildered... wrong response?"
posted by found missing at 3:51 PM on June 9, 2010 [2 favorites]

Cute reference to The Terminator. I don't think many people will recognize it.
posted by Houyhnhnm at 3:52 PM on June 9, 2010

Are you ready for your Mystery Update?
posted by box at 3:52 PM on June 9, 2010

How does "Microsoft Search Enhancement Pack" NOT sound like a bad idea?

IE 8 is a pretty good browser, as was 7.
posted by gjc at 3:52 PM on June 9, 2010

The problem is that there are people who still consider IE a viable browser.

This.
posted by Fizz at 3:53 PM on June 9, 2010

This isn't the first time they've done this -- there's updates for Office, for .net, for sharepoint integration, all kinds of stuff works its way into firefox, all without good and informed consent.
posted by boo_radley at 3:55 PM on June 9, 2010

We still have to support IE6 in our builds. Good times!
posted by Mister_A at 3:55 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

I updated my copy of W7 yesterday and didn't get any mystery Firefox extensions.
posted by reptile at 3:56 PM on June 9, 2010

Cute reference to The Terminator. I don't think many people will recognize it.

You're right, it's a pretty obscure film (80s lol) and not many of us here - a motley collection of geeks, film nerds, technophiles, savants, and absorbers of cultural minutiae for the purposes of making offhand comments, basically people who spend most of their lives sitting and looking at screens or bits of paper - will have seen it.

Oh, and if you couldn't tell I was being sarcastic.

:P
posted by turgid dahlia at 3:58 PM on June 9, 2010 [17 favorites]

Additional testing determined that the update is only being offered to those with one of the Microsoft toolbars installed

This explains why reptile (and me) didn't see it.
posted by wildcrdj at 3:59 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

turgid dahlia: Oh, and if you couldn't tell I was being sarcastic.

So was I. But you knew that, I'm sure.
posted by Houyhnhnm at 4:02 PM on June 9, 2010

Is this something I'd need to use windows AND have already willingly installed a Microsoft toolbar to understand be affected by? (Yes, it appears that it is. We can now commence with the pointing and laughing at pjern for having already been using such a toolbar prior to this update.)

And what definition of "viable" does the most widely-used browser in the world not meet?
posted by finite at 4:05 PM on June 9, 2010

/hamburger

And the link is borked.
posted by SLC Mom at 4:06 PM on June 9, 2010

I love hating MICROS~1, but this fpp sucks.
posted by finite at 4:06 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

I turned off Windows Updates after MS busted me for using a pirated copy of Windows 7.
Every now and then a balloon pops up in the corner saying "I'll be back."
posted by Flashman at 4:15 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

Actually no, it says "Your codes. Give them to me."
posted by Flashman at 4:16 PM on June 9, 2010 [9 favorites]

bz, that's because it's what they're getting pre-installed. I've met very few people who switch back to IE after trying another browser. And as vastly improved as IE8 was and IE9 is looking, they're still playing catch up. More importantly, the way Accelerators and Add-ons and toolbars are handled are all potential problems. How many times have you seen someone's IE loaded up with all kinds of crappy little toolbars they don't even remember installing?
posted by JaredSeth at 4:17 PM on June 9, 2010

Oh but maybe you're fortunate enough to work in an environment where they don't "sell" admin rights to the clients (so only the most important and least technically savvy people wind up getting them) and maybe all of your friends don't just do everything as an administrative user but I'm in the unenviable position of supporting those exact circumstances on a daily basis.

I'm not bitter. Really.
posted by JaredSeth at 4:19 PM on June 9, 2010

My mom lives in a nursing home with a computer room -- not a lab, really, just a room with a few things connected to the internet, available to the residents. The woman who runs it is mostly there to physically help them use the machines (lots of mobility issues) and doesn't know much about computers at all.

The machines are so packed with farkin' toolbars (Yahoo/IE/various other crap) it's almost impossible to see the screen in IE, and even in Firefox: my mother's account has five, one atop the other, taking up half the screen. I suspect these are automatic installs, but you need a password to delete them, and the lovely lady who runs the place thinks they might be 'important'.
posted by jrochest at 4:36 PM on June 9, 2010

"The Bing Bar".

That is all.
posted by brokkr at 4:37 PM on June 9, 2010

I can't wait until Lucid supports my wifi card.
posted by ryoshu at 4:55 PM on June 9, 2010

On Superbowl Sunday, Firefox will show nothing but static.
posted by gwint at 5:05 PM on June 9, 2010

So, in the wireless eavesdropping thread, geeks and nerds are telling regular users "well, if you didn't read the manual cover to cover and keep up on all the latest tech news, you basically asked to get your data stolen."

Meanwhile, over here, geeks and nerds who should know better still not only use Windows but also let Microsoft (Microsoft) install software directly on their computers without revealing what they claim to be doing, much less any source code.

Privatized software is bad for everyone collectively and you personally.
posted by DU at 5:11 PM on June 9, 2010

INSTALL IMPORTANT WINDOWS UPDATES?

POSSIBLE RESPONSE: 
YES/NO 
OR WHAT? 
GO AWAY
PLEASE COME BACK LATER
>> FUCK YOU, ASSHOLE <>

posted by mrnutty at 5:16 PM on June 9, 2010 [4 favorites]

On the other hand, Microsoft gives its employees freaking amazing insurance. If it didn't mean a move, I would be doing everything in my power to work for them.
posted by stoneweaver at 5:27 PM on June 9, 2010

The problem is that there are people who still consider IE a viable browser.

Yeah, like only 63.20% (as of today).
posted by ericb at 5:39 PM on June 9, 2010

bing.


bar.


BINGBAR!

bingbar! bingbar!

bingbarbingbarbingbarbingbar

BARBING!

I am easily amused.
posted by desjardins at 5:41 PM on June 9, 2010 [4 favorites]

brokkr: ""The Bing Bar".

That is all."

Bada boom bada Bing!
posted by bwg at 5:48 PM on June 9, 2010

Microwhat? Patch Tuesday? OH. It's a Windows thing. Umpteen patches and viruses and stuff? No thanks. *opens up shiny MacBook Pro.....running Linux* /asshole
posted by Cat Pie Hurts at 5:54 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

It takes more than just that closing tag, Cat Pie Hurts. In fact, once you enable that option, you can't undo it.
posted by crunchland at 6:05 PM on June 9, 2010 [2 favorites]

I would never go back to IE even if I weren't on a Mac because IE always annoyed me, but I do wonder about Chrome.

Right now, Firefox is my browser of choice. It lets me do all these cool Greasemonkey things, but Chrome is supposedly very fast, and I'm not sure I need all the bloat. The kids are saying, "Go Chrome!"

But I have 1Password and I'm not sure how it would work with Chrome and so I'm on the fence.
posted by misha at 6:08 PM on June 9, 2010

I first started using Firefox a year or two before IE7 was released. My machine at the time had only 512MB of RAM and I had a love-hate relationship with Firefox, because it had so many great features but seemed to leak memory like a sieve and while I loved tabbed browsing, I had to constantly kill the browser and all of my tabs in order to free up memory. And if I used the Session Saver plugins at the time, I was back to square one when I re-opened it.

Opera was a little speed demon, but like a V8 2-door coupe with twin turbos, it wasn't always practical for everything and didn't make a good daily-driver.

Lately Firefox has massively impressed me and I can barely stand IE8. Luckily Firefox works great on our corporate (Sharepoint) intranet at work (probably because of evil sneaky updates to Firefox like this). In fact, once you start using all sorts of funky widgets and webparts and start pulling in feeds from other sites (i.e. Facebook) IE8 positively struggles with our Sharepoint site.

WTF MS
posted by aydeejones at 6:42 PM on June 9, 2010

I pretty much didn't care what browser I used. Most of them suck in one way or another. In fact most of them suck generally, just being huge and overcomplicated and never finished before the next even less finished revision is released. I mainly used IE because it's just there but I hated 7 (thanks to the bug that trapped the URL bar atop the menu, which could only be rectified by editing the registry) and so never progressed to 8. And thanks to all the corporate web apps that require it all the websites I care much about still supported IE6 so whatever.

I had an older machine at work though that was on the net side of our air gap which was so old and slow (300 MHz P2) it eventually started crashing regularly even on nominally lightweight websites because of flash content in ads. So I downloaded firefox because I knew it had flashblock. Problem solved. So I kept using firefox on that computer and IE on all the others because whatever. When I switched from crappy breaks once a year DSL to better quality but metered Verizon 3G, I put firefox on my home computers so I could run flashblock to keep the bandwidth usage in check. But I still didn't care much about the considerable number of other machines I use now and then.

Then, after years of wrestling with the "how do you effing print a webpage that's framed and not have the frame you really want cropped" problem I discovered the Aardvark add-on.

Now every computer I use has firefox set as the default browser.
posted by localroger at 7:01 PM on June 9, 2010

I currently mostly use Chromium on my computers, and a firefox derivative on my phone; I actually expect to be doing the opposite within the next year. It's nice having some actual competition in the browser market!
posted by finite at 7:12 PM on June 9, 2010

You!
I wanna take you to a Bing bar,
I wanna take you to a Bing bar,
I wanna take you to a Bing bar, Bing bar, Bing bar.

Let's start a war, start a nuclear war,
At the Bing bar, Bing bar, Bing bar.
Wow! (Shout out loud)
At the Bing bar.

Now tell me do ya, a do ya have any money?
I wanna spend all your money,
At the Bing bar, Bing bar, Bing bar.

I've got something to put in you,
I've got something to put in you,
I've got something to put in you,
At the Bing bar, Bing bar, Bing bar.
Wow! (Shout out loud)

You're a superstar, at the Bing bar.
You're a superstar, at the Bing bar.
Yeah! you're a superstar, at the Bing bar.
You're a superstar, at the Bing bar.
Superstar.
Super, super, superstar
posted by NortonDC at 7:21 PM on June 9, 2010 [3 favorites]

Umpteen patches and viruses and stuff? No thanks. *opens up shiny MacBook Pro.....running Linux*

Eh? Every major Linux distro has a security patching system. Every operating system ever made (even Cisco's IOS) needs periodic security updates.

Anyway, Microsoft is being dickish. I fucking hate it when they install their bullshit plugin. Thankfully their OS is such a piece of crap that you can actually hunt down the file and delete it (if not through their shell, then through a Linux live disk, or using a stream finder [for when they hide the file in those ridiculous 'metadata' streams attached to files]).
posted by spiderskull at 7:34 PM on June 9, 2010

Yeah, my Ubuntu install bugs me for patching at least as often as my Windows 7 install. Probably more.
posted by Justinian at 7:36 PM on June 9, 2010 [1 favorite]

Microsoft delenda est.
posted by neuron at 7:43 PM on June 9, 2010

Semper ubi sub ubi.
posted by crunchland at 7:52 PM on June 9, 2010

Yeah, my Ubuntu install bugs me for patching at least as often as my Windows 7 install. Probably more.

But is there an Ubuntu Bing bar? Or worse, an Ubuntu Bing bar bug?
posted by mazola at 9:58 PM on June 9, 2010

Thankfully their OS is such a piece of crap that you can actually hunt down the file and delete it

My god do I hate the ability to locate and delete files!
posted by KingoftheWhales at 9:58 PM on June 9, 2010 [2 favorites]

Every operating system ever made (even Cisco's IOS) needs periodic security updates.

Um (*pssst* ... not if you don't attach them to the Web. 'S true, I have two computers that haven't been updated in years. And they still run all the software I loved back then.)
posted by Twang at 11:19 PM on June 9, 2010

What?! Not attaching a computer to the web is like locking a child in a room!
posted by maus at 12:29 AM on June 10, 2010

This isn't the first time they've done this . . . all without good and informed consent.

c.f. my paternity suit against Steve Balmer.
posted by yerfatma at 5:18 AM on June 10, 2010 [1 favorite]

not if you don't attach them to the Web.

... also you should avoid attaching them to anything that has ever been attached to the internet (which is not really possible if you want to run modern software).

Though ATMs typically sit on private networks or VPNs, the most serious worms in the last year have demonstrated that supposedly-isolated networks often have undocumented connections to the Internet, or can fall to a piece of malicious code inadvertently carried beyond the firewall on a laptop computer.

posted by finite at 8:15 AM on June 10, 2010 [1 favorite]

via Lifehacker:

"You're probably fine leaving the helper installed for Internet Explorer, but if you don't like the extension cluttering up your Firefox, you can delete the "firefoxextension" folder from C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Search Enhancement Pack\Search Helper. You may need Administrator rights to remove the file, but once you do, the extension should be gone from your Firefox install, according to vigilant mozillaZine Forums users. The SEPsearchhelperie.dll file is the IE add-on, in case you wanted to kill that off, too."
posted by sharkfu at 8:36 AM on June 10, 2010

Microsoft explains mystery Firefox extension, "fixes" update
posted by Artw at 7:03 AM on June 12, 2010