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Comment by nightski | Hacker News Reader

I just installed the Anniversary update. It did not replace my default browser. It did however suggest making Edge my default with an option to do so. I cancelled this.

It also added Edge to my taskbar but did not replace either Firefox or Chrome. Are you sure it replaced it?

Seems like some misinformation here.

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There's nothing which says that Microsoft does the same thing to all installations of Windows. They could be doing A/B-testing, treating installations in certain regions where they fear legal repercussions nicer, or just trying to confuse users, so that we bash each others heads in, instead of theirs.

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.

I feel at this point in our society the reverse proves true more often than not.

It's usually a matter of misaligned incentives. People are working in their own best interests within the structures available.

So true in America. I hate that quote so much because reality is the opposite.

Never attribute what Microsoft does to stupidity that which can be adequately explained by malice.

Yeah, I'm positive. There was no user interaction involved: when I came back to my laptop, it was updating, and when the updated completed all the changes I described had been made. Privacy settings had been reset, Edge had become my default browser, and the Edge icon had taken Firefox's place on the taskbar.

MSFT thanks you both for your participation in an ongoing AB test.

It could be a Europe vs. other region thing, or similar, too?!

Or maybe they are putting all that telemetry to "good" use.

I've had the firefox icon disappear from where it was pinned on the task bar after an update as well.

Europe here: it did the same to me too in my main pc. Wondering what will happen to my laptop where I actively removed a lot of the telemetry functions with some scripts I picked up from github...

I guess it's not misinformation, I think it's a case that is more complex than expected.

You can create a desktop icon with a link to IE/Edge, Firefox, Chrome, but you can create also a desktop icon with a link to the current default browser.

The problem is that if you have selected Firefox as your default browser, then one of the default icons looks like a link to Firefox, with the Firefox icon, but it actually a link to the default browser. If you copy or drag&drop it, then it look like Firefox, but it's a link to the default browser.

It's very difficult to spot the difference, and after a few months you will forget what kind of link it was.

If the Windows Update changes the default browser (perhaps automatically, perhaps a confusing question in a popup), then your icon to Firefox will change to an icon to Edge.

(I had a similar problem when I changed the default browser form IE to Chrome last year in one of the computers at work.)

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