Yes, and they were widely mocked. Privacy fears don't really sell, especially when deployed 10 years too late by a company that is the definition of "establishment".
In general, the average user doesn't care about privacy or security at all.
I develop a network virtualization product, and I spent a ton of time on security aspects of it. Sometimes I feel like that time might have been wasted, because it has thousands and thousands of users and so far not one single person has inquired about anything related to its security. Not one. It blows me away.
With windows 10, I have to pay for the software, and somehow I'm still the product? I don't know their end game, and its really sketchy.
Microsoft lost the internet and mobile platforms to Google. They are going to fight tooth and nail for the PC.
If the average person doesn't give a shit about privacy (and they truely don't), then Microsoft will not be able to charge for products Google supports for free with spying/ads.
Did anyone actually fall for that?
Intelligent systems need information to function, and when the intelligence is personalized, it needs personal information. One of the reasons Google has succeeded is because of that personal information, providing services that have enough context that they are three quarters of the way to my destination before I've even started.
It is enormously jarring how over the top Microsoft went with Windows 10, with insane defaults and little justification, but this is the manifestation of the whole "cloud like" platform. Increasingly we expect a world where a device is just a terminal into a platform, and we can jump to different devices and form factors and the world is almost the same. That is what Microsoft is trying for, clumsily.
For the handful of people who care deeply about data collection, yeah. For the rest of the 900+ million, it's really not a concern.
Edit: I know it sucks to hear, but your concerns about privacy are hardly shared among the general populous.
I really don't think most people expect their operating system to be spying on them.
It's one thing if you're on gmail.com or facebook.com and those sites collect info about you. People expect that. Most people probably don't expect Microsoft to install a keylogger on their computer. (Not that Google and Facebook are in the right, but I don't think they are equivalent.)
http://www.zdnet.com/article/does-windows-10-really-include-...
Also, your link does not appear to have been updated on Jul. 29 when the author says the final release should have been available. The Ars Technica article we are discussing is from today, Aug. 13, while the ZDNet article is from almost eight months ago (Jan. 27).
http://www.zdnet.com/article/does-windows-10-really-include-...
Yet, you unquestioningly repeat it.
Local system search while sharing some basic diagnostics data with Microsoft does not share the search queries.
WiFi passwords could be shared with your Windows 10 using Facebook friends, if you allow it. If you care about privacy that much, don't allow it, or better yet, don't use Facebook.
I couldn't find any evidence that Windows 10 shares any worthwhile application activity data.
Yet, it is somehow perceived as a Watergate-level of betrayal, but at the same time it is ok to praise Google for scanning your entire mailbox.
To me this just looks like a bunch of 90s kids struggling to shake off the "Evil Micro$oft" groupthink.
Why are you quoting an ancient article (one that, humorously, incorrectly claims that the typing data telematics was just some temporary preview release inclusion, when actually it made it to production), when the actual privacy policy of Windows 10, when you install it, tells you that it will monitor and send "typing data" to Microsoft? Microsoft left this very nebulous, but ultimately that simple privacy setting allows them the legal right, and the technical facility, to log every keystroke.
"I couldn't find any evidence that Windows 10 shares any worthwhile application activity data."
Somehow I don't think you actually looked, given how aggressively you have attempted to defend Microsoft in this whole discussion.
No one thinks Microsoft is evil, but rather that they tried to out-Google Google (not very long after their terrible series of anti-Google ads that you even mentioned), taking the basic principal of Google's activities and multiplying it.
Although it is possible to turn it off.
I think it would do them good to be more clear on how exactly they use and collect that data.
In fact I think this page should be read by everyone here: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-10/windows-privac...
I didn't find anything huge about application data, I'm sorry. Worst case scenario: your computer crashes and an error report contains a memory snapshot with some of your data. Like any other mainstream operating system today.
This discussion shouldn't defer evidence to either mine or your authority or personality. It doesn't matter if I was aggressive or not. In fact, my defence of Microsoft is relative. In my opinion, it is stupid to feel offended about Microsoft's privacy practices, while supporting an even more invasive behaviour by Google. Among those two it is Google, whose business model of selling targeted ads actually depends on collecting personal data from their users. Yet it seems, they are above any scrutiny.
That's what I've been trying to say. I didn't say anything about any anti-Google ads, because I have no idea what those are.
Finally, seeing people selectively whine about privacy on a social network, even a rudimentary one, like HN, seems absurd.
Joking aside, you realize what you just have said is naive? Any form of privacy invasion can be - and eventually will be - used for nefarious purposes.