7 ms·

The sad part is that it's totally possible to run Windows without any of the snooping and annoying extras: our corporate Windows PCs run great, no distracting a

The sad part is that it's totally possible to run Windows without any of the snooping and annoying extras: our corporate Windows PCs run great, no distracting anything. It's just the consumer that gets screwed and, let's be honest, who is willing to pay the actual price of a SW license anymore? I remember paying hundreds of dollars for SW in the pre-internet era. So instead of paying in dollars you now pay with your data. The fact that Linux is still underrepresented on the desktop just shows that we're willing to put up with it to get the shiny thing.

3pt14159 5y ago
I'm happy that I pay for my macOS software license each time I buy a computer. I was happy paying for Windows in the past too. I was happy to accept free software from Canonical for my little Ubuntu Eee PC and I think I once donated $10 or something like that. I don't mind paying software developers for great software. But if they start pumping it full of antipatterns and trackers I'm out.
- im_down_w_otp 5y ago
  FWIW, it's rarely developers who establish the incentives for "antipatterns and trackers". There's a very, very strong sentiment out there about what does and doesn't qualify as a "fundable business" with respect to both business models and shapes of products. This backdrop creates very strong incentives to make one's business and associated products conform to those archetypes. Right now "antipatterns and trackers" one of the allowable archetypes. For better or worse, depending on the perspective.
  - 3pt14159 5y ago
    I don't disagree, but I don't fully agree either. Developers can usually choose whom they work for. If the boss brings in trackers and such they can usually leave for another job. I know there are employment visas that complicate things, but broad strokes it is true. I have empathy for the developers of Windows at Microsoft. They really do have high stakes, real impact work and it is hard to differentiate "gal who stopped the whole global economy from grinding to a halt" from "guy who wrote the tracker tech" but at the end of the day I'm not paying for an OS that tracks me. I won't pirate it either, but I won't pay. I am sick and tired of this model and for some things it's just a bridge too far for me to accept. I accept that I'm a bit of a hypocrite here. I use Google Chrome and I use Google Search and I know they're not perfect, but at least I know that it is confined to "web stuff" and not buried in the OS. Call it old fashioned but if Canonical didn't let me uninstall Amazon bloatware I would not have used Ubuntu, and thankfully that dark chapter in their history is over.
Ashanmaril 5y ago
> The fact that Linux is still underrepresented on the desktop just shows that we're willing to put up with it to get the shiny thing. I don't know if I would call Windows a "shiny thing." It's cemented as the standard because of years of backwards compatibility.
- insulanus 5y ago
  Yeah, in this case the compatible applications are the shiny thing.
  - Ashanmaril 5y ago
    A computer is nothing to most people without compatible applications
- atoav 5y ago
  As someone who uses both Kubuntu and Windows 10 daily, between the two I'd definitly crown Linux with KDE to be the shiny thing. It is amazing how usable KDE has become, including settings, calender, presentation tools etc. Windows feels like a cluttered shed in comparison.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
> The fact that Linux is still underrepresented on the desktop just shows that we're willing to put up with it to get the shiny thing. Alternatively, it just shows that the Linux Desktop experience is still so terrible that people put up with Windows's bullshit. I know I'm in that camp. In theory I'd love to be running an open source OS, but in practice Linux Desktop just annoys me with its completely backwards way of doing just about everything I want to do with a computer. And before you start: no, this isn't a hold over opinion from 2008. I have used Linux Desktops on and off since 2000, have contributed to FOSS software, put together my own distro once, and was once president of a LUG. I speak from experience: The problems I have with Linux Desktop are deeply rooted and systemic and show no signs whatsoever of improving.
- monoideism 5y ago
  That's why you focus on command line. Much more productive anyway. Only need X for browser and maybe 1 or 2 other apps.
  - Orou 5y ago
    The command line is much more productive for programmers. The entire issue with open source OS adoption is that these systems are not being designed with non-technical users in mind, and their GUIs are lackluster to say the least. I really don't understand this attitude. It's like a woodworker talking about how much better handcrafted furniture is than the mass-produced stuff you'd buy online. Of course it's better! But does that really mean the answer is for everyone to spend years learning furniture-making? Same goes for computer systems: most people are not, don't want to be, and never will be technical users. If we want open-source systems to beat closed-source, consent-engineered spyware from dominating people's online lives then we need to meet them where they are.
    - AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
      I don't even think it caters particularly well to technical users, since I am one. I think it caters mostly to C programmers who don't use GUIs and web developers. Anyone else is encouraged to change their use case to match if they want to use a Linux Desktop.
entropy1111 5y ago
>it's totally possible to run Windows without any of the snooping Researchers found that even Enterprise with special "baselines" installed was still sending data. Is this not the case anymore?
temac 5y ago
> who is willing to pay the actual price of a SW license anymore? Windows 10 Pro is $200. Pro for Workstation (mandatory for some computers) $309 -- and it includes the same shit as Home and Pro, I think. Granted OEM costs less than retail, but that always has been the case, and OEMs do not necessarily pass the savings to the consumers, sometimes on the contrary (esp on pro hardware)... Would be interesting to know the typical OEM pricing of Windows 7 and Windows 8+, though. Anyway, Retail price actually is somehow less than the price during the Windows XP/Vista/7 era (it went down to the current levels with Windows 8). However there has been for example uninterrupted growth for Windows revenues since 2015 including historical records since 2017 (edit: source: https://dazeinfo.com/2019/11/12/microsoft-windows-revenue-by-year-graphfarm/ https://dazeinfo.com/2019/11/12/microsoft-windows-revenue-by... ). And I think that does not count the ancillary revenues of MS selling our asses to random other companies. So could they do without that crap? Probably. Will they? Probably not. On the contrary they will require an online account for Windows 11 Home, for example :/ (and given the ridiculous hardware requirements, I'm sure they expect at the same time pretty neat licensing revenues)

3pt14159 5y ago

I'm happy that I pay for my macOS software license each time I buy a computer. I was happy paying for Windows in the past too. I was happy to accept free software from Canonical for my little Ubuntu Eee PC and I think I once donated $10 or something like that. I don't mind paying software developers for great software. But if they start pumping it full of antipatterns and trackers I'm out.

im_down_w_otp 5y ago
FWIW, it's rarely developers who establish the incentives for "antipatterns and trackers". There's a very, very strong sentiment out there about what does and doesn't qualify as a "fundable business" with respect to both business models and shapes of products. This backdrop creates very strong incentives to make one's business and associated products conform to those archetypes. Right now "antipatterns and trackers" one of the allowable archetypes. For better or worse, depending on the perspective.
- 3pt14159 5y ago
  I don't disagree, but I don't fully agree either. Developers can usually choose whom they work for. If the boss brings in trackers and such they can usually leave for another job. I know there are employment visas that complicate things, but broad strokes it is true. I have empathy for the developers of Windows at Microsoft. They really do have high stakes, real impact work and it is hard to differentiate "gal who stopped the whole global economy from grinding to a halt" from "guy who wrote the tracker tech" but at the end of the day I'm not paying for an OS that tracks me. I won't pirate it either, but I won't pay. I am sick and tired of this model and for some things it's just a bridge too far for me to accept. I accept that I'm a bit of a hypocrite here. I use Google Chrome and I use Google Search and I know they're not perfect, but at least I know that it is confined to "web stuff" and not buried in the OS. Call it old fashioned but if Canonical didn't let me uninstall Amazon bloatware I would not have used Ubuntu, and thankfully that dark chapter in their history is over.

Ashanmaril 5y ago

> The fact that Linux is still underrepresented on the desktop just shows that we're willing to put up with it to get the shiny thing. I don't know if I would call Windows a "shiny thing." It's cemented as the standard because of years of backwards compatibility.

insulanus 5y ago
Yeah, in this case the compatible applications are the shiny thing.
- Ashanmaril 5y ago
  A computer is nothing to most people without compatible applications
atoav 5y ago
As someone who uses both Kubuntu and Windows 10 daily, between the two I'd definitly crown Linux with KDE to be the shiny thing. It is amazing how usable KDE has become, including settings, calender, presentation tools etc. Windows feels like a cluttered shed in comparison.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago

> The fact that Linux is still underrepresented on the desktop just shows that we're willing to put up with it to get the shiny thing. Alternatively, it just shows that the Linux Desktop experience is still so terrible that people put up with Windows's bullshit. I know I'm in that camp. In theory I'd love to be running an open source OS, but in practice Linux Desktop just annoys me with its completely backwards way of doing just about everything I want to do with a computer. And before you start: no, this isn't a hold over opinion from 2008. I have used Linux Desktops on and off since 2000, have contributed to FOSS software, put together my own distro once, and was once president of a LUG. I speak from experience: The problems I have with Linux Desktop are deeply rooted and systemic and show no signs whatsoever of improving.

monoideism 5y ago
That's why you focus on command line. Much more productive anyway. Only need X for browser and maybe 1 or 2 other apps.
- Orou 5y ago
  The command line is much more productive for programmers. The entire issue with open source OS adoption is that these systems are not being designed with non-technical users in mind, and their GUIs are lackluster to say the least. I really don't understand this attitude. It's like a woodworker talking about how much better handcrafted furniture is than the mass-produced stuff you'd buy online. Of course it's better! But does that really mean the answer is for everyone to spend years learning furniture-making? Same goes for computer systems: most people are not, don't want to be, and never will be technical users. If we want open-source systems to beat closed-source, consent-engineered spyware from dominating people's online lives then we need to meet them where they are.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
    I don't even think it caters particularly well to technical users, since I am one. I think it caters mostly to C programmers who don't use GUIs and web developers. Anyone else is encouraged to change their use case to match if they want to use a Linux Desktop.

entropy1111 5y ago

>it's totally possible to run Windows without any of the snooping Researchers found that even Enterprise with special "baselines" installed was still sending data. Is this not the case anymore?

temac 5y ago

> who is willing to pay the actual price of a SW license anymore? Windows 10 Pro is $200. Pro for Workstation (mandatory for some computers) $309 -- and it includes the same shit as Home and Pro, I think. Granted OEM costs less than retail, but that always has been the case, and OEMs do not necessarily pass the savings to the consumers, sometimes on the contrary (esp on pro hardware)... Would be interesting to know the typical OEM pricing of Windows 7 and Windows 8+, though. Anyway, Retail price actually is somehow less than the price during the Windows XP/Vista/7 era (it went down to the current levels with Windows 8). However there has been for example uninterrupted growth for Windows revenues since 2015 including historical records since 2017 (edit: source: https://dazeinfo.com/2019/11/12/microsoft-windows-revenue-by-year-graphfarm/ https://dazeinfo.com/2019/11/12/microsoft-windows-revenue-by... ). And I think that does not count the ancillary revenues of MS selling our asses to random other companies. So could they do without that crap? Probably. Will they? Probably not. On the contrary they will require an online account for Windows 11 Home, for example :/ (and given the ridiculous hardware requirements, I'm sure they expect at the same time pretty neat licensing revenues)