Forced by EU law to require Microsoft to disclose data privacy details in the new version of Outlook, which is based on WebView2, Microsoft and 772 partners and advertising companies jointly collect user data and push personalized ads and evaluate the effectiveness of advertising. Another incident related to Outlook in the past few days is that Microsoft has begun to forcefully promote the new version of Outlook to some users, and the UWP version of the mail and calendar applications will be forcibly deactivated.
Microsoft originally planned to discontinue the UWP version of email and calendar in mid-2023, but it was postponed due to excessive user opposition. However, the UWP version of email will still be discontinued later this year.
Now Microsoft's approach is a bit difficult to understand. According to news released by the German technology website WindowsArea, they have noticed that Microsoft has begun to forcefully promote the new version of Outlook. When users open the UWP version of the email, Microsoft will pop up a short prompt telling the user to migrate to the new version of Outlook. This prompt will only be displayed for 5 seconds and there is no action button. Regardless of whether the user agrees or not, Microsoft will automatically redirect the user to the new version of Outlook.
Of course, this new version of Outlook is also installed automatically. It is a network application based on WebView2, so it can be easily installed by Microsoft as long as it is connected to the Internet.
At present, this work of Microsoft is gradually promoted to users in different regions. Another German technology website, GHacks, did not see the notification when testing on Windows 11. Blue Dot did not see the notification when testing on Windows 11. It may be that only some users temporarily received the notification and were forced to migrate to the new version of Outlook.
After the UWP version of email is forcibly deactivated, the only options available to users are the web version of Outlook, the Win32 version of Outlook, and the WebView version of Outlook. Of course, users can also choose to use other brands of email clients.
Bluedot.com currently mainly uses the Win32 version of Outlook, which is the version that comes with Office. It has no ads and no pop-up windows, but there is also a button in the upper right corner to try the new version of Outlook. Click it once and the new version of Outlook will be automatically installed.