I never understand Microsoft’s strategy with being absolutely full bore focused on locking in 100% of everyone to this crap, consistently.
It has to be cheaper to let the .03% of people who want to do their own thing just do their own thing than it does spend engineering work to try to constantly capture them. The average user already doesn’t know what “an ai” is and doesn’t care, and therefore will never change your defaults. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to re-disable copilot because MS has invalidated my registry and/or group policy changes to get rid of it
If I don’t want the feature even installed on my system, then let me make that choice. Gaming is the only thing holding a windows install in my house anymore and the second DRM in proton is figured out I’m gone.
Hardware is so cheap these days you can just have a separate machine for Windows-only tasks like gaming in your case (in my case it's macOS for music production) - and enjoy the freedom for all other tasks.
I'd be more comfortable with it if MS didn't have a long and well documented history of overriding user settings via patches to turn on features that users had explicitly turned off.
If MS wanted people to trust them to honor settings, they shouldn't have ignored settings for decades.
Sadly Microsoft has a history of enabling "features" after updates, even though the user has disabled it before. Of course only to "improve the experience".
AFAICT it's only going to work on Copilot+ branded systems anyway, and currently only the Snapdragon ARM machines have a beefy enough NPU to meet that criteria. Both Intel and AMD are working towards getting that certification with their upcoming CPUs though.
One can hope the AI hype train will have derailed in 5-10 years and Microsoft will have moved on to pushing some other nonsense that nobody actually wants.
> The latest preview update for Windows 11 version 24H2 contains a little surprise for those who don’t trust the software giant. It allows you to remove Recall, the coming AI-based timeline feature that will help Copilot+ PC users find things they did in the past.
So even when the feature can be disabled (but not uninstalled), Microsoft will at least make sure that "no means no" and not silently enable the feature again after an OS update right? Right?!
It's important that Recall is available to all Microsoft Windows users. The Microsoft ecosystem is a great value to its customers, and the obstruction of Microsoft's right to advertise to their users would be another example of how the EU hates their citizens. If you don't want Copilot, why can't you just buy another computer and let Microsoft customers enjoy their vertical integration? /s
Edit: Included sarcasm indicator because apparently people think this is a legitimate opinion serious people have in 2024.
Windows is good for one thing these days: Playing games via Steam. That's about it, and Linux is getting pretty good at that too - but not yet perfect. That's why I have to stick to Windows for my gaming PC for the time being.
> If you don't want Copilot, why can't you just buy another computer and let Microsoft customers enjoy their vertical integration?
Why doesn't Microsoft simply let me uninstall it? That would be the consumer friendly thing to do.
Is the question about Linux in general or about Pop_OS specifically? I've used it--the differences are going to increase once their new desktop environment releases, but right now it's comparable to Ubuntu except with some nice-to-haves (proprietary NVIDIA drivers are installed automatically, no software is delivered via Canonical's 'snaps' which are almost universally hated). I enjoyed it, but in my opinion, popular distros are more similar than they are different.
If you mean just replacing Windows with Linux in general: it's great, unless you need to run, say, Adobe Photoshop, Microsoft Excel, or Fortnite.
I had problems with configuring wine prefix manually. Some frameworks could be downloaded / installed. With some were problems. 32 bit wine worked, but 64 bit prefix did not most of the times.
There were attempts to auto configure apps, like bottles program. This did work quite well when I used it for simple programs.
As with Linux. It takes some time to get familiar. Once you set up everything correctly, it will just work.
I've never tried it, but my impression from other people is that it's unreliable and maybe doesn't even work at all for the newest versions of Microsoft Office.
I used to give Linux desktop distros a shot every few years for a long time but would always get fed up with something not working or not being able to run some games. The last time I have switched back to Linux (Mint, not PopOS) was around three months ago, it's been a very pleasant experience with comparably few glitches (some that have been fixed with updates, some that I am still dealing with) and I don't have any plans going back to Windows any time soon, if ever.
I am using it for two years as daily driver on two (Lenovo) laptops, and I'm loving it so far! Most things worked out of the box and the UI is a nice balance of being adaptable if you want it, but also having sensible defaults.
I keep having to bother with Windows for the sake of using a "real" Excel installation for some of my work, but Im really in love with the simplicity of just using Popos, whereas there are a thousand little spyware-annoyances whenever I boot up Windows again.
A couple years ago I wanted to try something simple for a daily driver and gave it a shot but it didn’t take long before its inadequacies became unbearable and I switched back; but they’ve been improving, so hopefully it’s much better now.
The unfortunate current state of the OS market: If you want a system that generally works without much hassle, Windows is the go-to choice, albeit with increasingly intrusive policies. For those who prefer customization, Linux offers a wealth of options, but be warned: if you lack a developer's background, your custom setups might break after an update. On the other hand, if you're looking for a rock-solid OS with minimal customization, macOS is your best bet, though you'll pay a premium and be locked into specific hardware. Personally, I wish Linux could take the lead in this battle, but it really needs to consolidate its resources to make a stronger impact.
It is a good thing that Windows 11 is optional. Microsoft seems to insist on making it an option which is relegated way back into the catalogue in the section where hardly anyone looks but that is their prerogative just like it is mine to avoid them and their products. The times of Windows dominance are over, mostly due to the rise of web and cloud offerings which have shifted the tech nexus from the operating system to the browser.
I don't understand how they can roll out this feature across all regions. Call recording laws are different in many jurisdictions, and this is like a superset of call recording. I think it's a useful feature for a person, but to collect info on other people (in calls, emails, etc that appear on screen) and be able to process it is like an evil superpower.
At this point the problem isn’t really the feature and if it’s optional or not, the problem is the comms and roll out are such a dumpster fire that it’s confusing everyone.
No, it really isn't, and I've been working with Linux on desktops since I installed slackware from floppy disks from the back of a giant book after having used Sparcstations. Every single implementation is terrible and breaks in weird ways.
I've been working with Linux on desktops, laptops, and servers for a decade.
Use Mint or Fedora for distribution. Use Cinnamon or KDE for GUI. Everything pretty much just works, man.
Games work -- Steam, Battle.net, Lutris, and others I am sure. Sleep works -- just as well as it does on Windows anyway. Network works -- better and easier than Windows IMO. Updates work and waaaaay better than Windows. Backups work. LibreOffice works. Browsers work. Tools work. USB thumb drives work. External USB enclosures work. CD/DVD drives work. I haven't tried blu-ray but I imagine that works too.
The only things that don't work are the things that lock you in to Microsoft. Those are vanishingly small numbers of things outside of business, and in business it's mostly because of inertia.
I'm running Sway on Fedora Asahi Remix and I've experienced fewer crashes than in macOS (and the few crashes was software I've installed, the system is rock solid). And these days, I trust Fedora and Debian's maintainers more than Big Corps. If you're only using a few apps and don't really care what the system does as long as you do your $job, macOS and windows are good. But any custom workflows and you're in a lot of pain.
Everything is terrible and breaks in weird ways, including Windows. It has so many weird bugs and broken behavior that people just kind of ignore because it's "default".
I did the same (installing Slack from floppies in 1996...and failing) and I've been running Linux as my main and only desktop first and laptop then operating system for... 23 years now. Windows Millennium was the last straw for me.
My family is Ubuntu-only since 10 years ago, and I have 2 daughters that only know Unity as the graphical UI for a desktop PC (well, the big one is unfortunately starting to see Windows at school).
n=1 but my mother-in-law has been rocking Mint since late 2019. It does everything she needs and hasn't had a single question about it since 2020. I apply updates when I visit her house every few months. Don't recall any issues with that, either.
Even Apple and Microsoft have to deploy an army of customer support agents to deal with problems, but you expect Linux to be trouble free? I don't expect anyone capable of installing windows to have trouble with Mint, Elementary, or Fedora.
I'm running Linux for decades now without problems. Gaming was Windows' last bastion, but SteamOS is looking more and more attractive. So maybe I can get rid of that crapware personally.
Not by a long shot. Windows-only enterprise software (QuickBooks, SolidWorks, etc.) is the last bastion, and that bastion is going to hold for a long time.
What they likely meant was "for the average user" which is close to truth.
Windows of course doesn't go anywhere and will have a significant market share for decades to come. But Linux has come a long way. I'm not even interested in it, and use it because it's the simplest "just works" OS without having to actively defend against various dark patterns and anti-features.
The customers of that particular bastion have LTSC, and enough capital to twist Microsoft's arm into including or excluding whatever features they prefer.
>QuickBooks is now mostly a website, we ditched the client-side app a few years ago.
QuickBooks Online is missing so many features of QuickBooks Enterprise that they probably shouldn't even share the same name. Many places I've consulted for are locked-in to Enterprise.
They also conveniently void your support if you use a VM, despite VMs working fine.
Seconding the gaming part (not that it's the last bastion - maybe, maybe not). I bought a Steam Deck about a year ago and was amazed at how well it works while running unmodified Windows games in Linux.
The experience was so good that a few months ago I tried Bazzite (a "flavor" of Fedora Universal Blue aimed at running Steam games easily) at home as a test and despite my nVidia card (which it really didn't support well until recently) it's been smooth sailing. If it matures a bit more, I may ditch Windows completely... and that was already the last Windows machine at home.
Every complex piece of software "breaks in weird ways", that doesn't make it terrible. It will also break if you're trying to do 'weird' things it's not really designed for.
Sure, you're clearly the expert. If we're measuring experience based on the age of ancient software then I guess you win because I only started with RedHat 5.1 from a CD.
But in 2024 you clearly are still the true expert and arbiter of what constitutes a working desktop OS. I mean I only use Linux on a desktop and a laptop every single day, so I probably don't really get it.
But truly, Linux gives me significantly less "broken in weird ways" issues, as you say, in daily use than Windows 10 does on the same hardware. Both sometimes do stupid things, and both sometimes require stupid incantations when things go wrong (please don't pretend windows doesn't, because it absolutely does).
The P part. It's taking screenshots of your screen every few seconds.
When enabled, yes, but it makes you wonder why Microsoft is making it so you can only disable it, but not uninstall it. If you wanted to be sure it was disabled, you'd uninstall it... but you can't. I'm sure Microsoft would never enable it by default after an update.
I think that's pretty obvious, no? Behavioral controls. You add a web cam screenshot to that desktop screenshot and sell real attention signals to advertisers.
When companies dominate a market, even with a few competitors, collusion and price gouging often follow. Weak antitrust enforcement has enabled these practices, limiting competition, inflating prices, and stifling innovation.
This not only harms consumers but also holds back economic growth. Strengthening antitrust policies could curb monopolistic behavior, promote fair pricing, and restore market competition.
The only reason I single out bigger businesses is because when you've captured a market and made it sufficiently difficult to leave, testing a max price is easy.
Markets finding the price which balances supply and demand is not price gouging. Demand went up because it was suppressed during the pandemic and there was also extra savings in the economy (due to saving during the pandemic + stimulus and overall increase in money supply).
No, price gouging is taking advantage of short term manipulations in supply and demand. If this happened during the pandemic then you might have a case. However what we are seeing now are long term, permanent changes to demand due monetary inflation.
I really can't make sense of what you wrote here. "taking advantage of short term manipulations in supply and demand" - assuming by "manipulations" you just mean "changes" here (since I don't really know how someone can manipulate demand) - this is just how markets find prices in general. Maybe you mean manipulations in supply, for example a vendor holding onto products instead of selling them in order to drive up the price. But again, this is just how markets find prices: vendors refuse to sell products until buyers pay a price they find acceptable.
It remains true that this is not objectively distinguishable from price gouging. Gouging is just a word for "finding prices that I think aren't fair".
Inflation is (was originally) the increase in monetary supply (when the Fed buys treasuries and prints money). That absolutely happened big time. And we're no where near back to 2020 levels. See: https://www.federalreserve.gov/monetarypolicy/bst_recenttren...
Notice how the level of inflation kind of matches the balance sheet curve if you assume the peak was that 9% (~June 2022)...now we're back down to ~3%.
But the Fed is talking about lowering rates, not increasing them further (because we're just magically on some 'glide path' back down to 2% I guess). I suppose you'll call that price gouging as well when inflation flares up again? Some of what's being "disguised" here are the definitions of words.
Just saying there are other factors at play. It's not all about the big bad corporations.
Per the source article, the features themselves are opt-in (ie not automatically enabled). I believe Apple is rolling out Apple Intelligence pretty much the same way yet it did not set off a firestorm of criticism.
Oh I'm sure they'll use whatever UX techniques they can to convince or dupe users to opt in. My point is that Apple is going to do the same. I'm not defending either of them, just saying it feels like a double standard.
They will find out, eventually. I think it'll be faster than MS's ability to do a u turn. Windows 11 is something I will never install, recommend or vouch for. I'm actually steering all my family and friends from Windows 11. I think this move by MS will make Apple more money.
Which we have to thank for Linux Desktop market share hitting all time highs this year.
My decision to switch to a Fedora Desktop earlier this year after 25 years of Windows gets reinforced with every new "Windows Feature".
It's been a refreshing change, native versions of JetBrains IDEs, Docker and most Daily Apps (e.g. VS Code, Discord, GitHub Desktop, Obsidian, etc) were available on Day 1, surprisingly all my flagship Windows Steam Games I tried also just worked, there's also a lot more developer tools and command line enhancements available for Linux without the weird uncanny valley context switching I used to live with when using WSL.
Linux Desktop is in great shape if you're thinking of switching away from Windows.
I switched to Ubuntu a few years ago and have 0 regrets. I have run into rare cases where something I am working on and need to test can only run on Windows but that's what VMs are for.
I wish gaming was better. That’s the only reason I’m still on Windows for my gaming PC. I know it’s vastly improved (Proton, etc) but I’d still have to ditch quite a few games in my library.
Weird outrage bait over a feature that doesn't have to be used and is off by default. I don't know why people are losing their minds over this other than some pavlovian Microsoft response.
Apparently it's only disabled by default because of "security concerns". That sounds a lot like after those "concerns" are fixed (or rather "no longer in the news"), it will be enabled by default.
It has to be cheaper to let the .03% of people who want to do their own thing just do their own thing than it does spend engineering work to try to constantly capture them. The average user already doesn’t know what “an ai” is and doesn’t care, and therefore will never change your defaults. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to re-disable copilot because MS has invalidated my registry and/or group policy changes to get rid of it
If I don’t want the feature even installed on my system, then let me make that choice. Gaming is the only thing holding a windows install in my house anymore and the second DRM in proton is figured out I’m gone.