12 ms·

All I want is to be able to give companies my money in exchange for not being spied on, manipulated, or locked into some walled garden. I can't for my OS - I ha

All I want is to be able to give companies my money in exchange for not being spied on, manipulated, or locked into some walled garden. I can't for my OS - I have to use free gnu/Linux because everyone else treats me like crap. Is my money not good enough for them? This is getting absurd

contravariant 8y ago
It seems like they can get people to sell their privacy and autonomy cheaply if they can convince them it's the normal thing to do. Having an option that doesn't do any of those things would undermine the illusion.
mav3rick 8y ago
The money you would likely pay would be less than what they can make by selling you ads (as a whole). If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business.
- yebyen 8y ago
  Is that really true? I feel like they would need _everyone_ to be willing to pay that much, and on a recurring basis somehow to make support sustainable. The value of marketing to Windows users is in the network effect. If one Windows user can pay $1000 to avoid advertising and change nothing else, the other users will probably hear about this and take notice. But if every Windows user is subjected to ads, I very much doubt that Microsoft is making $1000 in advertising revenue from just one person. Microsoft would never convert 100% of users to "ad-free" paid subscriptions, at any price. But they can make money directly from advertising to 100% of their users, and there is no "loss" except from attrition (which I would guess is still probably quite a bit smaller than their numbers for overall user-base growth.)
- aikah 8y ago
  > The money you would likely pay would be less than what they can make by selling you ads (as a whole). If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. So people used the same argument with games and loot boxes. But even if videogames cost $500 a copy, there is so much money to be made with loot boxes that they would still exist in these games at that price.
- reaperducer 8y ago
  If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. I don't think this is true, but if it is, please provide a link to prove the assertion. I doubt that companies are selling software at a loss with the intent to make it up in ad revenue. They're selling the software at a profit, and then getting ad revenue for additional profit. All this just to "maximize revenue potential" for a bunch of faceless investment funds.
- anoncake 8y ago
  There is plenty of reason to advertise to someone willing and able to spend >$1000 on software.
- autoexec 8y ago
  > . If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. Let's be honest though, if a company can make money doing something they most likely will do it. It wouldn't matter if you paid $100,000 a month to use windows, if they could make an extra $1000 selling your personal information and pushing ads at you they will.
  - ovao 8y ago
    If that were truly the case, wouldn’t Apple and Canonical be doing exactly that?
    - dsego 8y ago
      Except Canonical was doing exactly that with amazon ads in the launcher.
    - autoexec 8y ago
      Ubuntu did infest their OS with ads (via amazon). Last I checked they still did but backlash caused them to disable it by default. I can't speak to apple's data collection and ad practices but I'm guessing they've been doing some form of both.
- tracker1 8y ago
  Yeah... like the car dealers that just sold you a $50K car don't also try to get you to use them for your oil changes.
- lowercased 8y ago
  maybe they could compare my purchase history from various services along with the ads they've served, and at some point realize that I've never bought anything from an ad, nor ever bought anything, ever, that's been promoted through these ads, then finally stop showing them to me. It would be better experience for me, and also make their clickrate ratios go up for their advertisers.
aikah 8y ago
> All I want is to be able to give companies my money in exchange for not being spied on, manipulated, or locked into some walled garden. I can't for my OS - I have to use free gnu/Linux because everyone else treats me like crap. AFAIK a license is paid with every new computer coming WITH Windows, so it isn't like people get Windows for free. I'm not sure it is even possible to transfer Windows's license from computer to computer anymore, so why is Microsoft doing this? just because they can. Imagine tomorrow some f\*cking ads pop up each time you open the start menu, or on the background of the desktop, or on the login screen, or in Visual Studio Code because why not? Absolutely outrageous. "Pay for the product and you're no longer the product they say". and while we are at it, why not display ads on websites hosted on Azure even when you paid for hosting?
- IpV8 8y ago
  What do you mean tomorrow? When I open my start menu today I see ads for a bunch of games and apps that I don't have installed. When I see my lock screen I see a pretty nature photo with a couple of clickbait phrases on it like "If you think that this place is peacefull, then..."
  - matty22 8y ago
    That lock screen really chaps my jimmies. Either tell me what you want to tell me or shove off.
  - navaati 8y ago
    What bugs me to no end is that I really like the photos, and the text ads in it ruin it !
    - jboles 8y ago
      Bing Desktop is still around -- you can get daily pretty nature pics, without the overlaid ads. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35844 https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=358...
  - rzzzt 8y ago
swebs 8y ago
Why not give your money to the Free Software Foundation or your distro's donation page to encourage software that respects your freedoms? https://my.fsf.org/donate https://my.fsf.org/donate
- crankylinuxuser 8y ago
  I already do that. I've been a member for a while now. And we even ran a domaition drive for a local food nonprofit, and our COO would match to a nonprofit org we said. More to the FSF.
- jammygit 8y ago
  I do. Thanks for sharing the link :)
eutropia 8y ago
I had to spend several days manually ripping out huge chunks of Win10 to get something resembling the usability of XP. That included removing all of the updating utilities, hosts-file blocking of microsoft servers, removal of most of the preinstalled apps, as well as disabling and deleting all of the scheduled tasks which try to re-install and re-enable those settings. All this trouble so I can play modern PC games... Next system upgrade cycle I think I'll be moving to linux.
- closetohome 8y ago
  1998: I'd never connect a Windows box directly to the Internet. Hackers might break my computer. 2018: I'd never connect a Windows box directly to the Internet. Microsoft might break my computer.
  - antisthenes 8y ago
    Microsoft figured out it's easier to employ all the hackers rather than fight them.
  - Spivak 8y ago
    Oh man I get just a glimpse of what the Windows team has to deal with when applying patches it's absolutely insane. Never in my life have I had to worry that yum update was going to trash my system.
    - chii 8y ago
      But when it does, it rm -rf /
- nepeckman 8y ago
  Steam support for linux is really going places. I mostly play indie games and older games (so nothing too resource intensive) and Steam's custom wine distribution has been handling them really well. I think I might wipe my windows partition in the next month or so.
  - 8y ago
legulere 8y ago
The Elementary linux desktop [1] tries to get its users to pay. [1]: https://elementary.io https://elementary.io
- russdpale 8y ago
  Elementary is a great project. I am about to build a box for a single mother with two kids and I am thinking about using elementary for it because of its ease of use and similarity to mac.
- zanny 8y ago
  So does Canonical when you download Ubuntu. That being said, you really want money to go to developers making the software. Not to discredit the work of packagers and integrators (mostly at Debian) but actually writing the code at the end of the day is the deal breaker. For that you can donate to Gnome, KDE, specific projects like Krita, or Software in the Public Interest that funds a bunch of the non-umbrella projects like LibreOffice and Postgres.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
LeoPanthera 8y ago
I guess you're assigning "walled garden" to macOS, but macOS is still UNIX underneath, and you can run any open software you want on it. I still think it's an excellent option for the privacy conscious. There are plenty of free software based operating systems that will take your money. Red Hat seems like the most obvious one.
- Nexxxeh 8y ago
  The noise-dive Apple's software has taken, it might fall under the "treats like crap".
  - russdpale 8y ago
    It seems quite a few people have been turned off by the recent mac book pro fiasco as well.
    - stephenr 8y ago
      Fiasco?
      - setquk 8y ago
        Keyboard
        stephenr 8y ago
        We clearly have different definitions for the word fiasco.
      - JadeNB 8y ago
        > Fiasco? I don't know about the parent; but, as an MBP owner for almost 15 years, for me "fiasco" means "best-in-class keyboard and trackpad have become second- to third-rate." (Most complaints are focussed on the keyboard, and the Touch Bar's insistence on interfering with touch typing muscle memory; but I've found the trackpad has its own weird set of problems, at least on my machine.)
ip26 8y ago
You are probably willing to pay more than you are worth in ad revenue. But you, and I, are in the minority.
- ohithereyou 8y ago
  Not only willing, but capable. How many people could pay ongoing for their OS like they do for their car?
dpau 8y ago
How long until Microsoft starts inserting ads into our Github repos?
- dopamean 8y ago
  "I see you're building an app with a shopping cart. Why not just sell your wares on Shopify!"
- shados 8y ago
  I'd expect more like a deep LinkedIn integration to facilitate recruiters...as much as the thought makes me cringe.
  - rleigh 8y ago
    To be honest, if a tool could run a scan over all my github contributions, and then use that to find a really well matching job, that might be potentially very interesting. Finding a job which is a good match for your skills and interests is hard. If most of your contributions are public then making use of them would be potentially beneficial so long as it wasn't super creepy.
    - megous 8y ago
      Combine github data with linkedin data to get connection of developers to companies, and use that? Not that I'm suggesting them to do it... :)
      - rleigh 8y ago
        The main challenge would be the information asymmetry between both sides (as is already the case). It's one thing for the recruiter to be able to scan all your contributions. Would you as a potential recruit be able to do the same, and see what skills and techniques were /actually/ in use by the company. A tool which could generate an anonymised summary for both parties and compare them for mutual compatibility might be very nice.
Pmop 8y ago
Funny thing is that the only way you can achieve this is by installing free, open source operating system. >Is my money not good enough for them? This is getting absurd Yeah, this is surreal.
zanny 8y ago
I think its more that if the owners of software respected you at all they would not be trying to sell it you in a proprietary form to begin with. It should be no surprise that those trying to exploit and abuse copyright in an era when it makes no sense don't respect you just because you participated in the scam.
pickdenis 8y ago
What's wrong with using GNU/Linux? Also, they (Apple, MS) don't want your money. They want your freedom, which is virtually priceless. I'm sure a fat monthly fee will suffice, but yeesh.
chapium 8y ago
You could always just use thunderbird and make a donation.
- boznz 8y ago
  The last update changed the association of web email links back to microsoft mail, still cant figure out a way to change it back.. Why cant microsoft concentrate on security updates and leave the rest of my system the fuck alone.
sephware 8y ago
I know you're not necessarily looking for specific advice to this one problem, and I agree and would rather pay for software than be the product, but since email is the topic, have you looked into FastMail? You pay for it, there's no ads, and they don't sell your info.
Crontab 8y ago
I used to think that being open-source was enough to avoid being spied on but it is not. Ubuntu showed this with the Amazon search issue [1] and is apparently collecting telemetry with 18.04 LTS [2]. My understanding is that Brew also gatherings telemetry by default. Enabling telemetry collection as the default setting needs to end - even if it is well intentioned. [1] https://www.networkworld.com/article/2226648/opensource-subnet/canonical-flip-flops-on-ubuntu-s-controversial-amazon-feature.html https://www.networkworld.com/article/2226648/opensource-subn... [2] https://www.techradar.com/news/the-controversial-ubuntu-1804-lts-is-now-available-to-download https://www.techradar.com/news/the-controversial-ubuntu-1804...
- jammygit 8y ago
  Canonical doesn't seem as concerned with privacy as it could be, but at least the collection is opt-in at install time instead of being sneaky (let me know if I'm mistaken). I wish the fsf distros could get more contributors. I understand why corporate contributions aren't aimed in that direction, but I wonder why Trisquel doesn't have more hobbyists pitching in. edited to clear up opening sentence
- hsivonen 8y ago
  18.04 prompts you very clearly and the first report they let you see looks innocent. Is there something concretely wrong with 18.94 telemetry beyond objecting to even optional telemetry on principle? (I agree that the Amazon search thing was bad.)
  - Crontab 8y ago
    I've avoided Ubuntu since the Amazon-search issue, so I haven't tested 18.04 personally, but the second article I linked to says: "This data collection is turned on by default" I took this to mean that telemetry was being collected and, if someone desired, could be turned off after the fact. I have a problem with telemetry being opt-out (it should always be opt-in). If Ubuntu is prompting to allow or disallow the collection of data, then that is good news, as people are being asked for their informed consent.
bromuro 8y ago
Absurd yet Microsoft at its finest.
tomjen3 8y ago
No. Because if you have money to spend, then your ad spots are worth more than the average. And if you are so rich you can afford to pay not to see ads, those spots goes up even more. If you are so rich you can afford to pay this increased rate, those goes up even more. There used to be a time where ads on the internet were, if not outright illegal, then at least considered like spam is today. I am not sure we wouldn't be better of if we didn't go back to to those classifications.
- giobox 8y ago
  I’m honestly not sure that time ever really existed. Ads were as much a part of print before the web as they are part of the web today. You could maybe make this argument about popups before browser vendors killed that behaviour off, but ad banners where still a thing even with those. The idea that they were ever even close to “outright illegal” is almost certainly a stretch in the vast majority of legal systems.
Svoka 8y ago
So... Why not use macOS?
hakfoo 8y ago
I suspect the appeal of an ad model is that it's perpetual recurring revenue. It's the same direction they go when they desperately push subscription licenses (see: Office 365) They want a business model less dependent on people replacing their PCs every three years. I don't doubt they see a rapidly approaching future of management saying "these computers are more than adequate for office work and web browsing, so we won't replace them until they physically fail in 5+ years." It's an easier and easier argument to make, especially when we're running out of easy, cheap across-the-board performance boosts. (Office and Chrome don't run that much better on a new 32-core Threadripper than on a second-generation i5)

contravariant 8y ago

It seems like they can get people to sell their privacy and autonomy cheaply if they can convince them it's the normal thing to do. Having an option that doesn't do any of those things would undermine the illusion.

mav3rick 8y ago

The money you would likely pay would be less than what they can make by selling you ads (as a whole). If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business.

yebyen 8y ago
Is that really true? I feel like they would need _everyone_ to be willing to pay that much, and on a recurring basis somehow to make support sustainable. The value of marketing to Windows users is in the network effect. If one Windows user can pay $1000 to avoid advertising and change nothing else, the other users will probably hear about this and take notice. But if every Windows user is subjected to ads, I very much doubt that Microsoft is making $1000 in advertising revenue from just one person. Microsoft would never convert 100% of users to "ad-free" paid subscriptions, at any price. But they can make money directly from advertising to 100% of their users, and there is no "loss" except from attrition (which I would guess is still probably quite a bit smaller than their numbers for overall user-base growth.)
aikah 8y ago
> The money you would likely pay would be less than what they can make by selling you ads (as a whole). If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. So people used the same argument with games and loot boxes. But even if videogames cost $500 a copy, there is so much money to be made with loot boxes that they would still exist in these games at that price.
reaperducer 8y ago
If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. I don't think this is true, but if it is, please provide a link to prove the assertion. I doubt that companies are selling software at a loss with the intent to make it up in ad revenue. They're selling the software at a profit, and then getting ad revenue for additional profit. All this just to "maximize revenue potential" for a bunch of faceless investment funds.
anoncake 8y ago
There is plenty of reason to advertise to someone willing and able to spend >$1000 on software.
autoexec 8y ago
> . If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. Let's be honest though, if a company can make money doing something they most likely will do it. It wouldn't matter if you paid $100,000 a month to use windows, if they could make an extra $1000 selling your personal information and pushing ads at you they will.
- ovao 8y ago
  If that were truly the case, wouldn’t Apple and Canonical be doing exactly that?
  - dsego 8y ago
    Except Canonical was doing exactly that with amazon ads in the launcher.
  - autoexec 8y ago
    Ubuntu did infest their OS with ads (via amazon). Last I checked they still did but backlash caused them to disable it by default. I can't speak to apple's data collection and ad practices but I'm guessing they've been doing some form of both.
tracker1 8y ago
Yeah... like the car dealers that just sold you a $50K car don't also try to get you to use them for your oil changes.
lowercased 8y ago
maybe they could compare my purchase history from various services along with the ads they've served, and at some point realize that I've never bought anything from an ad, nor ever bought anything, ever, that's been promoted through these ads, then finally stop showing them to me. It would be better experience for me, and also make their clickrate ratios go up for their advertisers.

aikah 8y ago

> All I want is to be able to give companies my money in exchange for not being spied on, manipulated, or locked into some walled garden. I can't for my OS - I have to use free gnu/Linux because everyone else treats me like crap. AFAIK a license is paid with every new computer coming WITH Windows, so it isn't like people get Windows for free. I'm not sure it is even possible to transfer Windows's license from computer to computer anymore, so why is Microsoft doing this? just because they can. Imagine tomorrow some f\*cking ads pop up each time you open the start menu, or on the background of the desktop, or on the login screen, or in Visual Studio Code because why not? Absolutely outrageous. "Pay for the product and you're no longer the product they say". and while we are at it, why not display ads on websites hosted on Azure even when you paid for hosting?

IpV8 8y ago
What do you mean tomorrow? When I open my start menu today I see ads for a bunch of games and apps that I don't have installed. When I see my lock screen I see a pretty nature photo with a couple of clickbait phrases on it like "If you think that this place is peacefull, then..."
- matty22 8y ago
  That lock screen really chaps my jimmies. Either tell me what you want to tell me or shove off.
- navaati 8y ago
  What bugs me to no end is that I really like the photos, and the text ads in it ruin it !
  - jboles 8y ago
    Bing Desktop is still around -- you can get daily pretty nature pics, without the overlaid ads. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35844 https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=358...
- rzzzt 8y ago

swebs 8y ago

Why not give your money to the Free Software Foundation or your distro's donation page to encourage software that respects your freedoms? https://my.fsf.org/donate https://my.fsf.org/donate

crankylinuxuser 8y ago
I already do that. I've been a member for a while now. And we even ran a domaition drive for a local food nonprofit, and our COO would match to a nonprofit org we said. More to the FSF.
jammygit 8y ago
I do. Thanks for sharing the link :)

eutropia 8y ago

I had to spend several days manually ripping out huge chunks of Win10 to get something resembling the usability of XP. That included removing all of the updating utilities, hosts-file blocking of microsoft servers, removal of most of the preinstalled apps, as well as disabling and deleting all of the scheduled tasks which try to re-install and re-enable those settings. All this trouble so I can play modern PC games... Next system upgrade cycle I think I'll be moving to linux.

closetohome 8y ago
1998: I'd never connect a Windows box directly to the Internet. Hackers might break my computer. 2018: I'd never connect a Windows box directly to the Internet. Microsoft might break my computer.
- antisthenes 8y ago
  Microsoft figured out it's easier to employ all the hackers rather than fight them.
- Spivak 8y ago
  Oh man I get just a glimpse of what the Windows team has to deal with when applying patches it's absolutely insane. Never in my life have I had to worry that yum update was going to trash my system.
  - chii 8y ago
    But when it does, it rm -rf /
nepeckman 8y ago
Steam support for linux is really going places. I mostly play indie games and older games (so nothing too resource intensive) and Steam's custom wine distribution has been handling them really well. I think I might wipe my windows partition in the next month or so.
- 8y ago

legulere 8y ago

The Elementary linux desktop [1] tries to get its users to pay. [1]: https://elementary.io https://elementary.io

russdpale 8y ago
Elementary is a great project. I am about to build a box for a single mother with two kids and I am thinking about using elementary for it because of its ease of use and similarity to mac.
zanny 8y ago
So does Canonical when you download Ubuntu. That being said, you really want money to go to developers making the software. Not to discredit the work of packagers and integrators (mostly at Debian) but actually writing the code at the end of the day is the deal breaker. For that you can donate to Gnome, KDE, specific projects like Krita, or Software in the Public Interest that funds a bunch of the non-umbrella projects like LibreOffice and Postgres.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

LeoPanthera 8y ago

I guess you're assigning "walled garden" to macOS, but macOS is still UNIX underneath, and you can run any open software you want on it. I still think it's an excellent option for the privacy conscious. There are plenty of free software based operating systems that will take your money. Red Hat seems like the most obvious one.

Nexxxeh 8y ago
The noise-dive Apple's software has taken, it might fall under the "treats like crap".
- russdpale 8y ago
  It seems quite a few people have been turned off by the recent mac book pro fiasco as well.
  - stephenr 8y ago
    Fiasco?
    - setquk 8y ago
      Keyboard
      - stephenr 8y ago
        We clearly have different definitions for the word fiasco.
    - JadeNB 8y ago
      > Fiasco? I don't know about the parent; but, as an MBP owner for almost 15 years, for me "fiasco" means "best-in-class keyboard and trackpad have become second- to third-rate." (Most complaints are focussed on the keyboard, and the Touch Bar's insistence on interfering with touch typing muscle memory; but I've found the trackpad has its own weird set of problems, at least on my machine.)

ip26 8y ago

You are probably willing to pay more than you are worth in ad revenue. But you, and I, are in the minority.

ohithereyou 8y ago
Not only willing, but capable. How many people could pay ongoing for their OS like they do for their car?

dpau 8y ago

How long until Microsoft starts inserting ads into our Github repos?

dopamean 8y ago
"I see you're building an app with a shopping cart. Why not just sell your wares on Shopify!"
shados 8y ago
I'd expect more like a deep LinkedIn integration to facilitate recruiters...as much as the thought makes me cringe.
- rleigh 8y ago
  To be honest, if a tool could run a scan over all my github contributions, and then use that to find a really well matching job, that might be potentially very interesting. Finding a job which is a good match for your skills and interests is hard. If most of your contributions are public then making use of them would be potentially beneficial so long as it wasn't super creepy.
  - megous 8y ago
    Combine github data with linkedin data to get connection of developers to companies, and use that? Not that I'm suggesting them to do it... :)
    - rleigh 8y ago
      The main challenge would be the information asymmetry between both sides (as is already the case). It's one thing for the recruiter to be able to scan all your contributions. Would you as a potential recruit be able to do the same, and see what skills and techniques were /actually/ in use by the company. A tool which could generate an anonymised summary for both parties and compare them for mutual compatibility might be very nice.

Pmop 8y ago

Funny thing is that the only way you can achieve this is by installing free, open source operating system. >Is my money not good enough for them? This is getting absurd Yeah, this is surreal.

zanny 8y ago

I think its more that if the owners of software respected you at all they would not be trying to sell it you in a proprietary form to begin with. It should be no surprise that those trying to exploit and abuse copyright in an era when it makes no sense don't respect you just because you participated in the scam.

pickdenis 8y ago

What's wrong with using GNU/Linux? Also, they (Apple, MS) don't want your money. They want your freedom, which is virtually priceless. I'm sure a fat monthly fee will suffice, but yeesh.

chapium 8y ago

You could always just use thunderbird and make a donation.

boznz 8y ago
The last update changed the association of web email links back to microsoft mail, still cant figure out a way to change it back.. Why cant microsoft concentrate on security updates and leave the rest of my system the fuck alone.

sephware 8y ago

I know you're not necessarily looking for specific advice to this one problem, and I agree and would rather pay for software than be the product, but since email is the topic, have you looked into FastMail? You pay for it, there's no ads, and they don't sell your info.

Crontab 8y ago

I used to think that being open-source was enough to avoid being spied on but it is not. Ubuntu showed this with the Amazon search issue [1] and is apparently collecting telemetry with 18.04 LTS [2]. My understanding is that Brew also gatherings telemetry by default. Enabling telemetry collection as the default setting needs to end - even if it is well intentioned. [1] https://www.networkworld.com/article/2226648/opensource-subnet/canonical-flip-flops-on-ubuntu-s-controversial-amazon-feature.html https://www.networkworld.com/article/2226648/opensource-subn... [2] https://www.techradar.com/news/the-controversial-ubuntu-1804-lts-is-now-available-to-download https://www.techradar.com/news/the-controversial-ubuntu-1804...

jammygit 8y ago
Canonical doesn't seem as concerned with privacy as it could be, but at least the collection is opt-in at install time instead of being sneaky (let me know if I'm mistaken). I wish the fsf distros could get more contributors. I understand why corporate contributions aren't aimed in that direction, but I wonder why Trisquel doesn't have more hobbyists pitching in. edited to clear up opening sentence
hsivonen 8y ago
18.04 prompts you very clearly and the first report they let you see looks innocent. Is there something concretely wrong with 18.94 telemetry beyond objecting to even optional telemetry on principle? (I agree that the Amazon search thing was bad.)
- Crontab 8y ago
  I've avoided Ubuntu since the Amazon-search issue, so I haven't tested 18.04 personally, but the second article I linked to says: "This data collection is turned on by default" I took this to mean that telemetry was being collected and, if someone desired, could be turned off after the fact. I have a problem with telemetry being opt-out (it should always be opt-in). If Ubuntu is prompting to allow or disallow the collection of data, then that is good news, as people are being asked for their informed consent.

bromuro 8y ago

Absurd yet Microsoft at its finest.

tomjen3 8y ago

No. Because if you have money to spend, then your ad spots are worth more than the average. And if you are so rich you can afford to pay not to see ads, those spots goes up even more. If you are so rich you can afford to pay this increased rate, those goes up even more. There used to be a time where ads on the internet were, if not outright illegal, then at least considered like spam is today. I am not sure we wouldn't be better of if we didn't go back to to those classifications.

giobox 8y ago
I’m honestly not sure that time ever really existed. Ads were as much a part of print before the web as they are part of the web today. You could maybe make this argument about popups before browser vendors killed that behaviour off, but ad banners where still a thing even with those. The idea that they were ever even close to “outright illegal” is almost certainly a stretch in the vast majority of legal systems.

Svoka 8y ago

So... Why not use macOS?

hakfoo 8y ago

I suspect the appeal of an ad model is that it's perpetual recurring revenue. It's the same direction they go when they desperately push subscription licenses (see: Office 365) They want a business model less dependent on people replacing their PCs every three years. I don't doubt they see a rapidly approaching future of management saying "these computers are more than adequate for office work and web browsing, so we won't replace them until they physically fail in 5+ years." It's an easier and easier argument to make, especially when we're running out of easy, cheap across-the-board performance boosts. (Office and Chrome don't run that much better on a new 32-core Threadripper than on a second-generation i5)