This trend is not unique to Microsoft, though. Gone are the times when companies at least pretended to care about making things better/easier/more convenient for the customer. Now all they do is make things more convenient for themselves, even if that goes exactly against the customer's interests.

One case for many. My local leisure centre offered a "10 for the price of 9" deal on swimming. You bought a booklet of 10 tickets and paid for 9. Nothing special, quite standard. The booklet was perfect because they did not have to know you, you always knew how many you had left, you could tear a ticket off and give it to someone... in a word, you were in control. A few years ago, they swapped the booklet for a plastic, credit-card style ID. Still the same "10 for 9" deal but... you have to sign up, give them all your details, and when you want to know how many sessions you have still left, you have to come to the reception desk and ask them to read the card for you.

Basically, in a single swipe, they threw away all the customer's convenience to gain a little bit of their own. When I pointed that out to them, they looked at me blankly, completely puzzled as if I speaking Liliputian or something.

Things like that are happening all over the place. Those who do it probably do not even realize that they do it and those who have to put up with it are getting so used to it that they treat it as normal.