Family safety: Feedback on recent changes to multi-device management

I fail to understand why that this development could not occur offline / separate from the currently functioning system.        

I'm a developer and while I know the best state of practice is to isolate layers of your system in order to be able to service and maintain them independently, sometimes in practice this breaks down. In these cases there are mitigation strategies used to bring users up to speed on the changes that are going to come and when to expect them, and how to prepare for them so users can accommodate for the changes. In the worst case scenario, things go horribly wrong and unexpected dependencies or interactions take place and then a post-mortem is needed to keep users abreast of what is happening and how it is getting fixed. This is how a company that is good with dealing with users handles these situations.

Microsoft does a pretty (sometimes a really) good job of this with Xbox and Azure, for example. Recently Gabe Aul has set a new high-bar of openness, honesty, respect and responsiveness to user feedback for the Win10 Insider program, even when dealing with many competing issues, and a wolf pack of tech press eager to criticize any MS misstep on Win10. Accelerating the Win10 fast track was fraught with peril, and Gabe did the right thing.

Family Safety team - what happened? How could you let us down so harshly, and then not give us some kind of post-mortem? People on this forum are tech savvy, no doubt, and I know that whatever you do someone will object and criticize, but erring on the side of transparency is a good trend. Follow your peer divisions there at MS, and get in front of this. Let us know the details of what happened, why and how it is going to be resolved.

I fail to understand why that this development could not occur offline / separate from the currently functioning system. Especially since Windows 10 is not formally released, there is no reason that it should need to affect the current system. In fact, they could always be separate and then the current family safety could be phased out when Windows 10 is actually available to be used.

Hi Russ,

My apologies, but I can't provide timing or any confirmation of features - my hope was to assure you (all) that the experience isn't good (and yes, far less than that) and we know it. 

That being said, the implementation of roaming child accounts (meaning that if you set up controls for the MSA it goes with the child regardless of the device they are logging into/using), is the plan for Windows 10.

Thanks Jen, it is outstanding to see that Microsoft is listening to their customers.  Very refreshing.

You need to understand that this goes beyond "less than ideal".  For parents that rely on software to protect their families, an uncommunicated change that put their families at risk, and continues to do so, is incredibly irresponsible.

Now, having developed software myself, I understand your comment about focusing on future software enhancements.  However, when my team did that, I made sure to spend extra resources, even "implementation translation" measures that cost a lot, but that kept the current user experience comparable or the same. 

Please give feedback to the superiors that they need to revert this change, and only move forward when the developers (the best in the industry) are able to come up with a plan that gives the upcoming software all the necessary new awesome features, without breaking the software we already paid for.

Right now I have 4 kids using 4 devices, equaling 16 weekly report emails, and 16 different user/device combinations to manage, with no idea how long I will have to do this for. 

Can we receive more details, that includes Microsoft seeing the move as a mistake, and what additional not originally planned steps they will take, please?

Regards,

-Marco