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Is the Microsoft Office Ribbon causing people to have fewer children? A provocative new working paper explores the persistent drop in birth rates since Office 2007 was introduced nearly two decades ago.
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Ever thought about how Windows Aero assumed desktop PCs would become thin clients, and servers would be empty glass rectangles?
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Therapist: Generic Microsoft Windows isn’t real, it can’t hurt you
Generic Microsoft Windows:156 40Jan 13, 2025 -
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Wait, Windows 10 is legacy now? 😳
Windows 10 reaches end of support in a few days’ time, and there’s been an increasing number of questions about what will happen to Windows 10 and Windows Update. We put together a new guide to answer your questions:49 24Oct 12, 2025 -
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Legacy Update has significantly expanded its archive of the Microsoft Download Center all the way back to 2012. It now indexes 41,000 downloads, of which over half have been deleted by Microsoft.
More about what went into this, and what we’re still planning to do:74 19Dec 1, 2025 -
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After 10 years, Windows 10 has reached end of support.
Don’t panic. Your Windows 10 computers will not explode. You will not catch every piece of malware in existence.
You should enrol in ESU, or switch to Windows 11 or Linux, but this is not the end of the world.
Our guide on what to do now:76 18Oct 14, 2025 -
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In response to recent industry changes, we’re making the entire 576 KB Legacy Update program available as freeware on a floppy disk.
Just send $1 to:
Homer Simpson, Jr. Vice President
Compu-Global-Hyper-Mega-Net
742 Evergreen Tce
Springfield, USA
Offer void in Nebraska.126 17Jul 3, 2026 -
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So long, Windows Update website 🫡
This week, Microsoft took down the old Windows Update v6 web app entirely. It was a time capsule locked in the Microsoft.com design from 2005. It’s been broken since 2021.
You can still see it preserved through Windows Update Restored.79 15Oct 2, 2025 -
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Today, Windows Server 2008 and 2008 R2 (based on Windows Vista and 7) finally, truly reach end of support.
Windows Vista and Server 2008 is the longest supported version of Windows, at 19 years. Behind it is Windows XP at 17 years, and Windows for Workgroups 3.11 at 16 years.45 14Jan 13, 2026 -
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Considering this is still going scarily viral I’m just gonna do the thing. Spend a bit of the money you saved by not having any kids on a worthy cause, the Internet Archive, who preserve our increasingly chaotic digital world for future generations. archive.org/donate
136 12Jun 14, 2026 -
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🌎⬆️ Legacy Update 1.13 improves handling of some edge cases you might run into while using Legacy Update. It includes 23 fixes and improvements (and plenty more small changes).
53 9Mar 16, 2026 -
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It’s done. Final database size: 138 GB. 15 days, just as I estimated.
Well, this is proof of why Microsoft wanted to remove drivers from WSUS. The whole WSUS 3.x product, which is almost as old as Vista, is not aging well.
No idea how we’ll upload an archive of this, but I’ll find a way.49 9Apr 19, 2025 -
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Features nobody asked for: You can now subscribe to Legacy Update news as an Internet Explorer Web Slice. Just click the green button in the toolbar (it’s green to show that Internet Explorer is really excited a website is actually using this feature), or the Add Web Slice link in our News section.
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Mozilla extended support for Firefox 115 ESR on Windows 7, 8, and 8.1 and macOS 10.12 – 10.14 until August. It was due to end support last month, and they may consider extending it again.
Firefox ESRs are old versions that continue getting security updates. support.mozilla.org/kb/firefox-u...48 8Mar 12, 2026 -
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You’ve been asking me for years, and I finally did it.
Windows Live Essentials was a suite of free add-on software from Microsoft. It’s a perfect fit into the Windows 7 experience, but it’s been hard to find official download links. Now, we have them easily accessible on a dedicated page:47 8Jan 7, 2026 -
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🌎⬆️ Legacy Update 1.12 is a huge rewrite release. We switched from compiling with Visual C++ 2008 (and 2010, and 2017, and 2022…), a setup which Microsoft recently broke, to a streamlined open-source MinGW/GCC toolchain. The result: 1.12 is 50% smaller than 1.11, which was already below 1 MB!
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What is going on with Windows Update and drivers?
A fair few people asked me what is going on with Microsoft’s recent announcement that drivers will be deleted from Windows Update, so I wrote up some notes about it:41 8Jun 28, 2025 -
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Just added a bunch more people to our starter pack! Lots of retro tech creators have joined Bluesky in the past few weeks. I recommend following all of them 😊 bsky.app/starter-pack...
Starter packRetro Tech Content27 8Dec 9, 2024 -
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Getting an error that the Windows Update service isn’t running, or is Microsoft Update not being enabled for you on Windows 7, 8, or 8.1? Microsoft just let a config file expire… *again*. It took 2 days for them to fix it in 2017 🤷♀️
We’re monitoring and will take action if they don’t fix it soon.27 7Jul 2, 2025 -
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Microsoft quietly extended Windows 10 Extended Security Updates to add another year. We updated our article about Windows 10 ESU to reflect this. If you haven’t seen it before, you might find it a useful read to know how to safely continue using Windows 10.
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🌎⬆️ Legacy Update 1.13.1 fixes a few bugs introduced in 1.13, and adds workarounds for issues with some Lenovo devices and Intel Macs. It also addresses a potential security issue.
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Introducing our improved website: If it seems like nothing has changed, that’s a good thing! I worked hard to build something that’s easier for me to maintain, while making sure everything is just as it was before. It will help us continue to expand our archive and help page resources.
52 6Feb 11, 2026
![Above a Windows Update window with a "Windows could not search for new updates" error, a dialog says:
Sorry, Windows Update isn't available right now
A law banning Windows Update has been enacted in the U.S. Unfortunately, that means you can't use Windows Update for now.
We are fortunate that Bill Gates has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate Windows Update once he takes office. Please stay tuned!
[Learn more] [Close app]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:3don7mh2mrixkaj6ey2rmbsn/bafkreid6gccmobwtrdxuswomq2zevdefmdknlma34dylskq5sek55ifxku)
