Microsoft Sets Itself Up for Trouble with Insiders (Premium)

Today’s announcement about a coming new Windows 10 feature called Sets was weird for a number of reasons. But the reaction from Insiders, at least in my Twitter feed, was uniformly negative.

As I noted earlier today in New Timeline and Sets Features are Coming to the Windows 10 Insider Preview, Microsoft will begin testing Sets in a coming Windows Insider Preview build. That revelation, curiously, came via an email from Microsoft’s Terry Myerson to Windows Insiders. That, I believe, is a first: I can’t recall Microsoft ever announcing a new Windows feature by email.

OK, fine. Microsoft’s communications skills are---to put it politely---a work in progress. We all know that.

But the bigger issue, I think, is that the software giant also decided that Sets would not available, at first, to all Insiders. Instead, it will do a form of A/B testing, or what it calls a “controlled study.”

“A smaller percentage of you will initially get Sets in a build,” Myerson told Insiders. “It also means that some of you won’t get it at all for a while, as we compare the usage and satisfaction of task switching in Windows for people who have sets versus people who don’t. Eventually everyone will get Sets---but it could be awhile.”

I think this is a mistake, and for a number of reasons. But put simply, Microsoft already has testing rings for this kind of thing, and Sets could simply be put in Skip Ahead for now, and brought to Fast ring when it's fully baked. Worse, this has a negative impact on Insiders, all of whom explicitly joined this community so that they could test new Windows 10 features. Keeping Sets away from most Insiders makes it feel like there is a first class and coach class in this program. And they’re in coach.

I’m more distressed by the pushback I’m seeing from various Microsoft representatives on Twitter, however. Faced with nothing but criticism from Insiders, some are getting a bit unprofessional. I’m not going to point any figures, but it got ugly quickly.

Which leads me to speculate that this understandable reaction is why Sets was announced by Terry Myerson in an email and not in a more normal fashion: It was designed to show the world that the decision to A/B test this feature came from above. The folks who run the Insider program can remain blameless.

Regardless of your take on this incident, it’s clear that many Insiders feel burned by this move. And it would be nice if Microsoft could handle these complaints with a bit more understanding. These are the company's biggest fans. And they feel like they're being snubbed.

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