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Windows needs to stop showing tabloid news
- VLM 4y agoEverything that's not "space aliens abducted my dog" is too politically charged in 2023, so they have to push tabloid content to avoid being cancelled.
- nubinetwork 4y agoI blame companies like taboola just as much as Microsoft for pushing trash like this... "do this to your android phone before friday", showing a picture of a microphone hole and a paperclip... I hope people don't actually fall for this shit.
- qrck13 4y agoThat was big enough reason for me to completely abandon Windows in favor of Debian
- sw104 4y agoI hate constant news. Cutting the news in large part out of my life has definitely improved my wellbeing. Now, I only check the news on Saturday morning, to know what's going on in the world. It leaves breaking news time to get the facts straight, and to filter out the non-news of the week.
- stathibus 4y agoIt's gets easier and easier every year to want an alternative to Windows, but it remains impossible to actually switch, at least for me.
- outsomnia 4y agoWhat's this year's lock-in / excuse... games?
- newjersey 4y agoI’ve given up on a one computer solution. I am currently on multiple computers. One thinkpad and an old dell optiplex run Fedora. Main desktop runs Windows. I can still ssh into my old dell optiplex from my windows desktop with its nice windows 11 power shell terminal. I can switch over to my thinkpad t490s and use Fedora with gnome (and still ssh into my dell optiplex because all of them are on the same home Internet connection and router (and same switch other than the thinkpad). One thing I’ve noticed is remmina isn’t quite the same as mstsc windows Remote Desktop but I think it is high praise that I could even get to the point of someday expecting it…
- happymellon 4y agoHonestly there is absolutely no reason to not switch to something else. Mac's have Office and Photoshop, and I haven't personally ran into any games I can't play on Linux. Shame that Microsoft haven't given Linux Office 365, because Microsoft ♥ Linux. Right?
- vladvasiliu 4y ago> Shame that Microsoft haven't given Linux Office 365, because Microsoft ♥ Linux. Right? For my basic needs, I've found that the office web apps actually work much better than the classic ones. Outlook, in particular, is much snappier. I use it daily on Firefox on Linux for work, since they're married to MS.
- happymellon 4y agoI use Office via the web and it suits 99% of my cases. I think the only issues have been some formatting options are hidden, I honestly don't remember them because it mostly works. It was more a cheap jab that they don't want to actually support Linux.
- vladvasiliu 4y agoI think that with the move to the web and web app everything, there are fewer and fewer reasons for people to use Windows as a client OS outside of specialty software. Hell, my last two HP laptops, nothing fancy, had worse hardware support on Windows than on Linux (where they were working 100% since day one), even with all the HP drivers installed. Took them about a year to fix this. So even "don't need to futz around with drivers" is no longer a reason. And I think MS realizes this, seeing that recent .net things work on Linux, MSSQL Server now works on Linux (but not the studio, though). So, I guess they're just trying their damnedest to stay at least somewhat relevant. Companies are usually a bit slower to change user-facing things, so I guess MS won't go out of their way to help with the switch.
- Ballas 4y agoI held the same belief until I made the switch. First on my work laptop, then at some point I realized I'm not using my Windows machine at all, now I only have Windows VMs for the rare occasion that I need to run something on it.
- realitysballs 4y agoI SO AGREE
- CommanderData 4y agoTracking and privacy on Windows is becoming atrocious, I didn't know about the built in keylogger until I ran a declutter tool. Unpopular opinion but to stop Microsoft's shenanigans = legislation. Opt-in by default would be a good start. Transparency tools to show what's being exported to MS. How about stopping forced major updates too. User needs protective legislation fast.
- jsmith99 4y agoWindows doesn't have a keylogger, and irresponsible 'declutter' tools can do more hard than good.
- LightHugger 4y agoWe are at the point where windows is irresponsible and those declutter tools are what the responsible user makes use of. You are irresponsible for not using them.
- jsmith99 4y agoWhat clutter? I removed the preinstalled news widget, turned off the telemetry options in the installer (I personally am ok with some light telemetry because I know from experience how useful it is as a developer but I agree it shouldn't be on by default). My NextDNS probably blocks it anyway. There are probably still a few preinstalled apps that I don't use, like candy crush, but they are mostly just stubs that don't download unless you use them - I wouldn't know as I never browse the start menu, I just type the first few characters and press enter. I check Autoruns occasionally and everything seems reasonably well-behaved, and I haven't had a BSOD in several years except for a few caused by crappy third party 'security' kernel drivers.
- nvllsvm 4y agoWhich declutter tools specifically?
- iakov 4y agoI think you are right. Many people in tech, and especially americans, sneer at the thought of regulation, but I don't see any other way to un-fuck the most popular personal computer OS in the market. If not for GDPR, my email and phone would be still vacuumed up by every e-shop and sold in bulk to some shady data aggregator. If not for the upcoming USB-C charger law, Apple would be putting their Lightning holes in all devices. Sometimes the invisible hand of the market has to be forced I guess. Legislation is usually too little and too late, heavy-handed, and hard to change. But it's better then the current state of things, where the users are constantly screwed with no viable alternative for their OS.
- alphabet9000 4y agoidk, i think 'tomshardware.com' needs a reality check. there's like 100 disgusting taboola and google ads on their own website that look identical to these awful microsoft ads. its hard to take a rant about trashy ads seriously coming from a page that is littered with them.
- AmVess 4y agoOne has reason to expect ads on a website, but not on their OS.
- insomagent 4y ago> The stories come courtesy of Microsoft’s MSN content network, which syndicates content from hundreds of web publishers: some reputable, some less so. Full disclosure: Our parent company, Future Plc, has a syndication agreement with MSN and many of its sites, including Tom’s Hardware, occasionally have articles appear on the network. What’s problematic here, though, is not that MSN syndicates content but that it often pushes the equivalent of the Weekly World News table of contents right into the Windows operating system where it can be hard to avoid.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- lexandstuff 4y agoThe difference is: I paid for Windows, but I didn't pay for tomshardware.com.
- easrng 4y agoi tried turning off my adblocker and yeahhhh the ads-to-content ratio is a bit out of control https://i.imgur.com/Dre5HJw.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/Dre5HJw.jpeg
- akira2501 4y agoWorth noticing.. the site also still works fine with ad block enabled and there was no nag screen or paywall around it.
- BurningPenguin 4y agoMSN also needs to actually moderate their comment sections. Too many tinfoil hats, trolls and far right extremists on the German version.
- moreresearchplz 4y agoThat would probably reduce the success ratio of their pageview and ad impression metrics. There probably is not a metric tracking quality or societal benefit.
- bowsamic 4y agoThe German version of every US website seems to greatly lack moderation.
- sph 4y agoPeople that comment on news websites tend to be kooks, trolls and those old people that love posting terrible memes on Facebook.
- kstenerud 4y agoI finally made the switch to Ubuntu Mate on Friday and WOW, color me impressed! The only reason I stuck with Windows on my desktop machine for so long was gaming, and the last time I tried switching over was 10 years ago. Spoiler: it was a shitshow. This time, things are MUCH better! The Mate desktop environment is simple, stable, clean, does the job and gets out of your way (kinda reminds me of Windows 2000). Steam's Proton makes running games a breeze. All of my favorites just work. I could even run battle.net as a non-steam game, USING Steam's Proton! And the kicker? Blizzard's recently opened beta of Diablo 4 just worked. As in, I clicked install, clicked play, and it just worked. Perfectly. As if I were still running under Windows. I've never before seen such sorcery. So bye bye Windows, except when I'm running one as a VM.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- qikInNdOutReply 4y agoWindows can be good, when its in vm-jello, frozzen in time, with no real network connection except for shared folders and the updaterapeware removed. Honestly, has anyone ever looked at these updates and though to themselves - "Yes, i need that!".
- tapland 4y agoGaming on linux has really taken off. Very few games, even with anti cheat for multiplayer, don’t work. It’s nice that running Linux is no worse than missing out on console exclusives
- lexandstuff 4y agoThis will surely be the year of the Linux desktop.
- gryn 4y agohas been the case for me for more than 5 years.
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- shmerl 4y agoUsing KDE is a breeze.
- Havoc 4y agoYep. It’s also just plain noise. eg it announces earnings are out and there is an accident on the highway. I don’t have a car and no idea which company’s earnings they think I care about. Nobody takes a step back and wonders whether it makes sense Feels like a real design by committee decision
- AraceliHarker 4y agoMicrosoft has a funny way of selling us ‘productivity’ with Windows 11. On one side of the screen, they promise us a sleek and smooth user experience that will make our work easier and faster. On the other side, they bombard us with widgets full of celebrity gossip and sports trivia that have nothing to do with our lives. What’s the point of that? Are they trying to distract us from our work or from their work? Maybe if Windows 11 were free, we could forgive them for their sneaky attempts to get us hooked on Bing. But no, they want us to pay 200 dollars for this dubious privilege. How are we supposed to feel about that? Grateful? Impressed? Satisfied? I don’t think so.
- Veen 4y agoPresumably, the teams who develop the OS do want to give us a smooth user experience and help us to be productive and efficient. But between us and them are other teams tasked with extracting the maximum value from Windows users and increasing engagement with Microsoft's shittier services. The same thing happens in web development. The developers and designers of news sites don't want to create an unusable mess of ads and auto-playing videos, but the business development guys love that shit.
- avnfish 4y agoThe microsoft org chart comes to mind: https://bonkersworld.net/organizational-charts https://bonkersworld.net/organizational-charts
- hkatx 4y agoThere is a viral clip of Lebron James saying he doesn't pay for spotify premium. If a multi millionaire can justify going through the friction of the free software, you can argue masses feel the same way. An app/service with frictionless UX that requires subscription/fees is just going have a very small percentage of users. A developer/small team may be content with that, but VC funded outfits are advised and need to have a massive growth of user to justify further rounds. So the app/service has to be free with ads/other dark patterns to boost engagement/revenue. (exceptions that come to mind are netflix but even they have an ad tier now)
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- nathants 4y agohttps://github.com/hellzerg/optimizer https://github.com/hellzerg/optimizer
- thih9 4y agoNote that this is the case elsewhere, we just learned to ignore or block that ad space. This article itself on my mobile has in its body: > Sponsored Links / The 5 Books To Read To Transform Your Life / Blinkist Magazine
- kyriakos 4y agoWould be cool if you could replace the news source with an rss feed
- jimmySixDOF 4y agoThat would be handy. Designing your own front page to the internet was the height of web 2.0 AJAX & RSS but the idea is still valid and haven't seen a better replacement for what was easy back then despite Reddit's catchphrase.
- kyriakos 4y agoit may be possible for someone to hack this functionality into windows 11
- PrimeMcFly 4y agoI don't want anything, any type of news being pushed by my OS. It simply isn't it's job. Maybe, as an option or optional add-on, but not the way MS does it. I use 10 now, as locked down and 'fixed' as I was able to make it (custom ISO via NTLite with a bunch of crap removed and some fixes steamrolled in), but really I look forward to ditching it altogether - which is a shame. For all the MS hate in the OSS community, I always thought Windows did a lot of stuff well (when it was good at least). The telemetry, changing things for the sake of changing things and forced crap constantly being added is enough. I'm so in love with awesomewm at this point, and the fact that I can customize and program every part of my UI, allowing me to have something absolutely perfect and tailor made.
- voldacar 4y agoCould you share your ISO or the process you used to make it? Was it easy or is there a bunch of esoteric stuff you have to fiddle with? I'm switching to 10 for my new PC build and I'm about to do a ton of research on decrapifying the OS
- midoridensha 4y ago>I don't want anything, any type of news being pushed by my OS. It simply isn't it's job. Yes, it is. The job of a proprietary OS is whatever that company says it is. If it's shoveling annoying ads to users, that's its job, and having annoying ads is a very sensible thing in a proprietary OS since the company is driven by profit, and they can make more profit by including lots of annoying ads. If you don't like the product your vendor has sold you, then you should choose a different vendor. A Free OS that doesn't come from a company with a profit motive won't have this same problem.
- alkonaut 4y agoThe whole "just go elsewhere" idea doesn't really work in a total monopoly like Microsoft has on desktop OSes for some use cases. There is not, and has never been an alternative to windows for all use cases. Most notably: a gaming rig (One of few remaining use cases for stationary home PCs these days, so perhaps the most relevant for the idea of the Microsoft monopoly on the desktop). If you want to reply that Linux is a perfectly usable OS for a gaming rig these days then please reconsider. It's just not. I actually don't understand how Microsoft reasons around these things. There is zero way that these news links actually "pay for themselves" in income vs customer alienation. There must be something else to it.
- amanzi 4y agoIt's not just the search windows, Windows 11 also introduced a new sidebar feature with customisable widgets but there was no way to turn off these crappy articles completely. From memory you could customise them somewhat by providing some preferred interests, but no way to turn them off. I no longer use Windows at home - that was the last straw and am now completely on Pop_OS.
- ourmandave 4y agoThat sounds like an attack vector for malware, like the old windows desktop widgets they finally had to shutdown and turned off by default.
- aquir 4y agoI’ve tried moving to Linux but the simple task of using my laptop closed with a second screen was impossible so I went back to Windows 10. I will give Linux a try next year again…or but a Macbook
- flipbrad 4y agoI'm sorry this doesn't work for you. It has worked fine for me for years.
- Symbiote 4y agoChange the setting for what happens when you close the laptop. You need to do the same on Windows and MacOS. I remember finding the latter very confusing the first time I tried to play a movie with a projector connected and the lid closed. It would sleep, unless I first connected an external keyboard.
- nunodonato 4y agoI do that everyday, works fine
- midoridensha 4y agoWorks for me, with 2 external screens and a Thunderbolt docking station.
- aquir 4y agoI am trying to do this with HDMI connected but once I close the laptop the external screen is reduced to a 1 FPS laggy mess. I have a laptop with 2 GPUs (1 in the CPU and a discrete one) and tried everything...no luck
- midoridensha 4y agoDual GPUs is asking for trouble on Linux. Mine is just regular Intel integrated graphics. I have also tried my work laptop on the same docking station setup though, and it uses an Nvidia GPU. It seemed to work fine too. I suspect the dual GPU is not well supported on Linux.
- favsq 4y agoThe following program which someone recommended to me here in HN has been a godsend in this regard since it allows me to configure my taskbar the way it was in Windows 10: https://www.startallback.com/ https://www.startallback.com/
- casenmgreen 4y agoI have the same problem, but to a much, much lesser extent, with Reddit. When I click in the search box, it converts into a drop-down list of news headlines. If I want news, I'll click on news. Don't force it on me : I avoid news normally, because I find it's almost all unpleasant click-bait. I do not appreciate being forced to look at it, even for a few moments.
- BurningPenguin 4y agoOld reddit is still available. Just type old.reddit.com or change it in the settings.
- devinprater 4y agoI guess this is one good thing about being blind and using a screen reader. It never has to focus on those ads, so I never see them. Of course, MS folks probably come here oh dear God they're gonna turn them into notifications so I have to hear them now I'm sure. Can't wait until KDE is accessible so I can switch to Linux.
- jraph 4y ago> Can't wait until KDE is accessible so I can switch to Linux I'm curious (as a KDE user myself), why KDE and how do you know it's the one you want given it's not accessible? Why not any other desktop environment? By the way, your testimony to the KDE team could matter!
- themoonisachees 4y agoWhat features would you need out of KDE to make it accessible to you?
- rkagerer 4y agoDoes Classic Start Menu solve this? (It has its own search box)
- ht85 4y agoSeeing this makes me really sad for the countless people who are forced to use Windows, most of them because they simply do not know better. I have a Windows installation that I boot sometimes and pretty much every time I do something despicable happens, though I understand I am not the target audience.
- herbst 4y agoSame here. I even have WMs wake up after a year of not using them just to watch them instantly break themselfs. It's not fun, it's 2022 and fixing OS level issues shouldn't be what we spend our time on
- pjmlp 4y agoAs proven by Android, and Netbooks before it, having OEMs shipping Linux distributions won't change it.
- ht85 4y agoOf course, because linux targeted at non-tech users allows greedy publishers to do the same things as microsoft. I used to think educating people was a solution, which it might be to some extent... truth is without regulations brought and enforced by people who understand the modern digital world and have the end users best interest in mind (lol), the cat will never go back to the box.
- warner25 4y agoYes, I keep an old laptop around with Windows 10, which sometimes goes months without powering on. When I do boot it again, it potentially takes hours of non-deterministically finding and downloading and installing updates over multiple reboots. Compare to powering on a Linux machine and bringing it up-to-date in one shot with "sudo dnf upgrade."
- seydor 4y agoIf you 're working , taking a break with trash news is all you need. In any case, i am sure you can remove those things because i have done so ages ago
- jbigelow76 4y agohttps://www.windowscentral.com/software-apps/windows-11/how-to-disable-annoying-ads-on-windows-11 https://www.windowscentral.com/software-apps/windows-11/how-...
- oliwarner 4y agoI left Windows in a hail of Vista bugs, over a decade ago. I've seen it get worse and worse in that time, both in UX rot and anti-consumer "features". I'm almost impressed with what people willingly put up with. Not here to eulogize over what I moved to, but I think it's important people consider why they're still using Windows. It's not your friend.
- PaulHoule 4y agoThe Linux desktop left me. Somehow the community just doesn’t get that it is possible for text labels to fit in the space that is allocated to them. Contrast that to the refinement of the command line interface experienced through ssh. It’s taken Linux what, 15 years, to not make the same transition that Microsoft did with WDDM in Vista? I’m annoyed by the “thoroughly pizzled” features in Windows such as the OneDrive file shredding system, attempts to stuff ads up your nose, etc. The thing is I can turn that crap off with a finite amount of effort, whereas Linux desktop enthusiasts can spend forever tweaking their desktop and it “just doesn’t work” no matter what you do. My satisfaction with a new Windows 11 machine I just built is about as high as my satisfaction with my Ubuntu server, the difference is that the Win11 machine has a GUI and the Ubuntu server doesn’t.
- nunodonato 4y agoThat's precisely the question I keep asking: how much more anti-consumer features people need, in order to switch? At this point it's hard to understand why there is so much resistance in leaving windows, I can't imagine having to deal with this kind of things on a daily-basis while trying to actually get stuff done.
- jsmith99 4y agoWhat kind of thing? That it comes with a News app that has a pre installed widget that can be removed with a single right click?
- herbst 4y agoCommon anti virus, weird update windows, weird scary Dialogs you learn to blindly confirm to install things. Blinking and animations in the taskbar, ... Not even a common design pattern for the annoyances. As someone who hasn't used Windows in more than 10 years the whole desktop is full of distractions popping up unasked. IMO it's horrible for a productive environment because it doesn't allow to focus properly
- throwaway049 4y agoAuthor should have led with how to get rid of them. This article is padded with example headlines, has little analysis and no tutorial.
- ohduran 4y agoIronically, all those videos that start playing and are hard to escape from as you read this very post are quite distracting, too. In view of this, it's hard to read this article as "why is Windows showing their stories and not mine?".
- bowsamic 4y agoI always thought it was quite funny how there was this dichotomy between Windows and macOS, with often the former being seen as more reliable or better for "getting work done". Then it seems that people remained in their camps to some degree, and over the last 5 to 10 years Windows has absolutely tanked in quality and appropriateness and a lot of those who use it barely seem to have noticed. Can you even imagine Apple putting Daily Mail articles in your dock for example? There would be vast backlash, but somehow this absolutely egregious, OS-destroying stuff that Windows is doing recently has been largely brushed off. Sorry to sound like the trope of an annoying mac fanboy, but Windows is grosser than ever, and I want nothing to do with it.
- charcircuit 4y ago>Can you even imagine Apple putting Daily Mail articles in your dock for example? Currently the notification center on my mac has stories from USA Today and The Washington Post. It's not that different.
- moondev 4y agoDosen't macOS put an undismissable red notification in your dock if you are not logged in to iCloud?
- tmnvix 4y agoNot for me
- zokier 4y agoIn couple of years Windows 10 will get eol'd and stop receiving security updates. It'll be interesting time certainly to see what the people who are contently now using Windows 10 without MS accont or Cortana or other online craziness, will do. I'm in that boat, but I have always been dualbooting Linux so to me changing it to be primary desktop won't be that big of a pain. But I do expect to see additional influx of new Linux users from the eventual eol. Of course some users probably will continue to use Windows 10 well beyond the eol date (there probably are still even some Windows 7 users around); heck, it might take good while until major vulns are found in Windows 10 after eol as the general security level certainly has improved.
- nikanj 4y agoThey really want Windows to become a tablet OS, and someone misheard and turned it into a tabloid instead
- buro9 4y agoThere was a time when operating systems were pretty good and the future was full of hope. Windows was capable and felt modern, Mac felt powerful and had neat things like "delete an app to fully uninstall an app". It feels like both of the major desktop/laptop operating systems have been on a downward spiral for a good long while. I'd left Windows about 15-20 years ago for Linux, and then made it to Mac — but to my surprise I found Mac was a lot worse than it used to be and definitely not stable. That's what I feel now — which is least worse? That is hard, because they're both pretty damn bad especially if you don't want to use an Apple account or Microsoft account. Linux is least worst, but let's be clear that to say that you're already accepting terrible power management on a laptop and fun with audio visual things and having to hope your job doesn't require some piece of proprietary software. Least worse if you do need proprietary software? It's all bad, may as well use Windows with a Mac wallpaper or vice versa just to signal general disdain at the hellscape we've collectively incentivised.
- herbst 4y agoTo be fair the power management issue is pretty much a niche issue at this point. Sure if you run closed down hardware like a Mac book don't except your drivers to work from day 1. If you go for a ThinkPad however there are usually no issues. Plus you can usually fix the power issues by just installing the right drivers or disable one or two well documented settings
- KirillPanov 4y agoThe secret trick for flawless power management and sleep on Linux is to buy a Chromebook and put Linux on it. They're natively Linux machines to begin with. All the manufacturer-coded power management stuff is upstream in the mainline kernel already.
- bpfrh 4y agothinkpads do have issues... S3 was disabled on some models which meant for the first 6 months of release you couldn't go to sleep. The new thinkpad yoga x gen 10 uses a intel webcam which uses a special binary blob and doesn't work out of the box, but only if you buy it with windows installed, which makes for a fun game of "does-this-laptop-support-linux-out-of-the-box" The thinkpad x1 carbon gen. 6 has problems when waking up: * Sometimes not waking up until you plug in a power problem * Sometimes having to disable/enable the trackpad to make all buttons work again. I'm quite happy with using linux on my devices, but many modern thinkpads have issues. Edit: didn't want to sound aggressive
- tlb 4y agoThere could be (and probably is) some little app that sets good defaults in Windows and turns off all the abuseware. But who would trust such an app? At some level, the problem is that any company big enough to build a trusted brand is going to follow its incentives to just stick a few ads on your screen. We see it also with VPNs and adblockers.
- Wingman4l7 4y agoThere are a couple well-followed free utilities that turn off all the Windows telemetry and clean up the junk from a fresh Windows install. They're trusted by communities that would instantly abandon them if they showed signs of "selling out". They manage to stay free and trustworthy as passion projects, mostly.
- polotics 4y agoIndeed this kind of trash helped me get back to my senses and switch to Mac...
- npteljes 4y agoI hate Windows for this, thankfully there's the LTSC version which has none of the nonsense. I'm using it for gaming, and it works well.
- tragomaskhalos 4y agoMost of my feed is sourced from one of our wretched right-wing daily newspapers (Briton here) - despite diligence in not reading any of these articles, rather instead selecting to hide from this particular source, which I've attempted numerous times, their occurrence only increases. I'd like to understand the algorithmic genius behind this behaviour.
- machinawhite 4y ago"Engagement"
- ly3xqhl8g9 4y agoFrom the article: "Windows is the most popular operating system in the world" Therein lies the rub, or lies the lie to be exact, a 38-year old+ lie: Windows was never an operating system (neither is MacOS for that matter). The system worthy of that name, operating system, is only a type 1 hypervisor (such as Xen because open source), where you truly operate over the system(s): any issue with some weird quirk in a machine? nuke it from orbit and spin another one. Your Adobe Photoshop application has nothing to do with your Fortnite game, and both of them have nothing to do with your browser and your propensity for tabloids: they should have never been and should never be on and under the same "operating system", perhaps not even on the same disk. Isn't it insane that we must sometime restart the operating system with all the apps because some single app crashed? How could this system design ever use the name "operating system"? The only benefit of cohesion is the corporate benefit: the system, and hence you, your data, your consumption patterns, are easier to manage if they are under one "operating system". And you, the faceless, nameless, general you, because you don't actually care about your data, about your attention, and perhaps not even about your life, oppressed as you are into being choiceless, hence powerless, deserve "operating systems" such as Windows, MacOS, and companies such as Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon, and nowadays "Open"AI.
- quaintdev 4y agoThey need to stop showing tabloid on bing as well.
- carom 4y agoJust disable that menu. I have the setting in Windows 11 Workstation. I assume it is in the free version as well. There are no ads in the start menu, all that junk is contained.
- amir734jj 4y agoIs there a script for windows 11 that disables all these ads and news and gives us no bs experience of windows 7?
- MikusR 4y agoYou need a script to automate two mouse clicks?
- josephcsible 4y agoThere are a lot of settings in Windows that need to be changed. If you look at any one in isolation, it doesn't make much sense to script it, but when you look at all of them at once, two clicks each start to add up.
- amir734jj 4y agoSwitched to PopOS 4 years ago before that was using Ubuntu. Haven't found a need to use windows ever since. Do yourself a favor and switch.
- varispeed 4y agoThere is more than that to this. Remember that news corporations are owned by billionaires and they show you the world through a lens that benefit them. They want you to be outraged at things they want, they want you to have blind spots, they want you to be distracted while they pick your pockets. True journalism no longer exists and the reason is that nobody wants to get killed for uncovering the truth.
- bdz 4y agoDesktop: Windows 10 LTSC (honestly people should use this if Windows, it's perfect) Laptop: Debian
- uncharted9 4y agoI've tried getting LTSC copies but they seem to be very difficult to source.
- bdz 4y agoAs always, Archive.org https://archive.org/details/en-us_windows_10_enterprise_ltsc_2021_x64_dvd_d289cf96_202112 https://archive.org/details/en-us_windows_10_enterprise_ltsc... LTSC is awesome, everything removed it's just an official vanilla Windows 10. I use it as a daily drive without any problems.
- Helmut10001 4y agoI just went down a rabbit hole to remove the "Discover" button in Edge (top-right corner): - `regedit` - go to `HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft` - add a key (folder) `Edge` (ignore the folder `MicrosoftEdge` if it exists) - in `Edge` folder, add a `DWORD` with name `HubsSidebarEnabled` and a value of `0`. - in Edge, go to `edge://policy` and click on `Reload Policies` - it should list the policy and the 'Discover' button should disappear
- lyu07282 4y agoAren't these kinds of hacks breaking every few months with new upgrades?
- Helmut10001 4y agoCurrently, there was no other way to disable the button - I tested all. In the future, I hope there's an official option or policy directly available without the registry. I just couldn't see the button anymore.
- kjuulh 4y agoAfter having been on Linux for years (Debian server and Arch desktop), and MacOS for work. Having to use Windows is downright jarring. Every time I have to fix something, or do regular tasks it become apparent how little windows is suited by itself for power users. As mentioned in the article, it can't get used to ads or tabloid news everywhere, it just feels wrong. I could spend some time removing them, but I'd rather not have to fight with Microsoft every time the product updates, I'd rather just avoid using it entirely. It is insane that you pay for a product, but is still served ads or tabloid news. When I use debian for my server usage, I have most of the essential tools available, but when I use windows I either have to install a whole bunch of tools, or make do with the lackluster experience. I dread having to fix a windows server installation. MacOS as well feels overrated, the UX has gotten noticeably worse over the years, unnecessary notifications that doesn't go away themselves, lackluster window management out of the box. MacOS is best for me when it exposes its unix roots so I can just get to work, the native stuff feels half baked at best. It does feel fast at least (m1 is a beast, by far the best laptop I've ever owned) Linux (Arch) feels like it puts the user in control, I've had less errors for my arch home-server (which does see quite a bit of traffic), it does have sharp edges but I always feel in control of what is going on, or at least have the tools to fix it. The desktop side is not quite as reliable, I've had to tinker with the bluetooth settings more than I'd like, that and audio (which may be a kde issue). Steam has been great, and I rarely have to jump into windows anymore. Linux (Debian) feels solid, it has been super reliable over the years. I may have become too used to the Linux way, which is why I am shitting a bit on Windows and MacOS, and those product definitely aren't for me. So take my rant with a grain of salt.
- Helmut10001 4y agoWindows + WSL works pretty well. I have all kinds of distros installed using Lxrunoffline, e.g. Debian Bullseye, Ubuntu etc. and WSL1 + WSL2 in parallel. I also start most of my Windows programs through WSL these days.
- kjuulh 4y agoIt really is a blessing. I feel like I can in good conscience publish my tools as *Nix only these days, because I know that my windows users can just launch it through wsl without problems. Now I don't have to deal with msvc and so on. Super nice. That said I don't even know if it is a viable option for windows server, but probably not =D
- prennert 4y agoI have the same in Chrome on my Android phone. Click on open a new tab and tabloid news are shown below the shortcuts of often used domains / links. Same when swiping left on the start screen (don't know what that screen does as I never used it due to the SHOCKING content..) There cannot be any good in this and it should stop. I see this as a notch to getting people accept more cookies etc so Google can present more relevant content (it's not like I browse any gossip page besides HN). But somehow I doubt that better content will be shown in those ad spaces if I allow for more cookies.
- toastal 4y agoIt’s trivial to use a different default browser like Bromite or Fennec instead of the adware default you were given
- haunter 4y agoWindows 10 LTSC for the win
- teekert 4y agoThis is insane indeed, on my work laptop I'm forced into Windows, what a mess! (Oh the glory of my clean KDE 5.27 on EndeavorOS at home, what a contrast, such beauty, such wobbly windows, such snappy tiling.) At some point I saw something about the Kardashians from my taskbar! Wtf, I though that with all this analytics Windows would at least show me something about Cardasians. I mean MS365 is nice, VSCode is nice, GitHub is nice... I gladly pay for all of it (not VSCode atm of course). But I really prefer them all from my clean KDE (or sometimes Gnome) environment. It's like Windows is the cheap part of the ecosystem, if you want to go full premium you replace that part of the chain with something else.
- Farbklex 4y agoI just want to be able to pay once and not get annoyed by any crappy news or adds. I am super annoyed about my Sony Android TV which for weeks shows me a huge "Audi" add that fills half the home screen. I am not going to buy that car ffs!
- pharmakom 4y agoThis will never end. Just move to Linux. Wine (and proton) are very good these days. For everything else there’s Virtual Box.
- pharmakom 4y agoA Windows PC… isn’t really your Personal Computer. Same for Android, iOS, Macs… it’s just that Microsoft (and some Android manufacturers) are abusing the power more than most.
- falcor84 4y agoSlightly ironic that this page shows me ads like "Stop Buying Lottery Tickets & Start Doing This Instead - Yukon Gold Casino"
- plaguepilled 4y agoThis is your scheduled friendly reminder to try out Fedora Linux if you haven't tried Linux seriously yet. Its a great first Linux experience and comes with stock GNOME, which is a treat. It also has a KDE version, which is similarly a fantastic GUI and actually influenced a lot of the design patterns people today associate as "windows-y" (I forgot where I read that one though, so I can't cite that particular tidbit)
- nobody9999 4y ago>This is your scheduled friendly reminder to try out Fedora Linux if you haven't tried Linux seriously yet. Its a great first Linux experience and comes with stock GNOME, which is a treat. Absolutely! I've been using Fedora for a long time and have been very pleased with it for my home systems. Although I prefer XFCE[0][1] over Gnome or KDE, and would definitely recommend it to recovering Windows users. [0] https://spins.fedoraproject.org/xfce/ https://spins.fedoraproject.org/xfce/ [1] Note that I don't use the "spin" I linked, rather I have multiple Kickstart[2] configs (including a 'desktop' config), but XFCE is XFCE. [2] https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/fedora/f36/install-guide/advanced/Kickstart_Installations/ https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/fedora/f36/install-guid...
- explorer83 4y agoYeah it's crazy, I used to work on PCs for a living and saw what a lot of people see when they use their PC and it was so clear how much they were throwing biased, not even remotely balanced, news articles at people's faces everyday. Maybe if the articles made an attempt to breakdown each sides arguments or something it'd be OK.. I guess.. maybe. But it was just tabloid style articles written about important current events as if only one side exists to every argument.
- Stracke123 4y ago[dead]
- sireat 4y agoWhat is the best way to go about creating a sane - meaning adware turned off as much as possible defaults for Windows 10? What I mean is preparing a custom ISO for installation. I realize that technically it should be possible: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufacture/desktop/system-builder-deployment?view=windows-10&preserve-view=true https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufactu... I have to handle relatives Windows machines quite often and have to reinstall Windows quite often. I like how Rufus adds a default local user to standard Windows ISO. So something like this with more customization would be fantastic.
- shp0ngle 4y agoHey with Windows integrating GPT-4, they can generate those articles themselves!
- leshenka 4y ago> Did you know that pigs eat humans (opens in new tab) “far more often than people expect?” straight outta snatch
- mihaaly 4y agoWindows is making so many and more small but frequent annoyances and barricades I have to navigate in the daily work - not to forget trivial mistakes like reminders in the background and alike - that I am in the process of moving towards Linux. Meanwhile, despite being more experienced in what I do than 20 years ago my productivity is not increasing much, mostly due to the barricades introduced (when I am not distracted and able to work I am more performant than before). And the biggest component in it are the tools and 'services' that forgot how to support users instead of asking users to support the whims and needs of software, making the life of software vendors not the life of the users easier. Which is especially true for Windows which is in an eternal and constant incomplete reshuffling of concepts while previously working easy matters got ruined and confusing to use. Taskbar, notifications, navigation, positioning of frequently used features, behaviour and reaction to actions are altered, with less benefit than the mere change disrupting the user workflow. The software highjacks and intentionally diverts the attention of the user instead of helping them work. Having higher and higher maintenance level instead of being helpful. Never ever asked marginal but broadly advertised things pushed through without choice generating noise and nuisance in daily, hourly work! Focusing on experimental AI matters while a simple switch between windows and similar elementary things are more difficult than 20 years ago is maddening. Shortly: I am increasingly dissatisfied with what and how MS is doing (while not having a bright history to begin with). I feel increasing disgust trying to do anything with Windows. This will not end well in our relationship.
- progx 4y agoFirst thing after install: disable all this sh.t. If i want entertainment, i open entertainmap apps or websites. I was wondering, that Microsoft is not in able to reduce all these things when you select a "work profile" at installation. They use windows too (i hope, or did their employees switch to apple or linux?), they must know, what productivity killer such "Features" are.
- alibarber 4y agoIt was having Nigel Farrage's tweets show up in the start menu on a box at work that did it for me. And no, there's no free speech on my or my company's desktop machines. I'm here to get work done - not be subjected to any political crap.
- defrost 4y agoFarrage has a cockwomble level that transcends politics, his content delivery is axiomatically objectional regardless of whatever side he takes.
- alibarber 4y agoAnd to elaborate - it's not really that he, or any other of his ilk, exist. Or the content of what they were saying (not that I care at all for it); The bit that made me angry the most was that, some PM at Microsoft actually thought "Yes, we will show divisive politics to a user who has paid for this software." Of course, they probably sold it as, "Let's _delight_ the user with treding twitter topics in $their_locale" - but if they didn't figure out what that would mean in the actual real world, then good heavens...
- witx 4y agoWindows needs to stop pushing news. FTFY
- alberto7 4y agoNews of any kind should not be pushed by an OS.
- nmca 4y agoI honestly sometimes wonder if msft execs use windows at all in their personal lives...
- juandjara 4y agoWindows needs to stop. Period.
- labrador 4y agoIn the latest Windows 11 Home update - Right click task bar, task bar settings, Widgets OFF. Solved the problem for me.
- vcryan 4y agoI make a conscious effort not to read any generic news and this would drive me insane. Even reading something like hackernews, there is a time and a place for that.
- zigzag312 4y agoWindows 11 Pro retails for $200, but behaves as if it were free and makes you a product. MacOS is locked in to vendor's hardware. Linux's support for closed source drivers is not that great. I wish there was an open source OS with stable driver ABI, so even closed source driver blobs would work for decades.
- kramerger 4y agoPro tip: Disable search & news, install Microsoft PowerToys and use PowerToys Run. Never open the start menu again https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/powertoys/run https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/powertoys/run
- hazbot 4y agoEvery time I get a new windows device, I have to go hunting for the arcane registry settings to disable the start bar ads. It is really jarring when I use a relative’s computer with the default ad vomit.
- a2tech 4y agoThey took a nice feature (showing the weather unobtrusively on your taskbar) and turned it into a nightmare where if your mouse accidentally passes through its space a giant popup shows up filled with the worst kind of junk news. Oh and on many (especially lower end systems) it causes terrible stuttering while its opening.
- TimJRobinson 4y agoGoogle too. There's an awesome swipe right screen on android that shows travel related information and upcoming events. But then they decided to add news articles to it and it's impossible to turn them off! You can only disable the entire feature.
- richiebful1 4y agoLooks like you can disable the news part by going to the Google Now feed > Settings > General. Unselect "Discover"
- deathanatos 4y agoAFAICT, this just renders the entire pane "useless", with nothing but a message, > Turn Discover back on to see your feed. You can always turn it off in Settings. Turn on Discover
- batch12 4y agoI agree on all counts. Funny though how the same types of ads being complained about litter this page.
- NotYourLawyer 4y agoIt’s even more distasteful when it’s the OS doing it.
- dschuetz 4y agoMicrosoft has a long history of abusing their market dominance within their Windows platform, coincidentally each case having something to do with online services. Microsoft has, would and will always do anything to make money and choke any competitive threats to death one way or the other. They won't even bother trying to be "less evil" like Google once tried and failed.
- photochemsyn 4y ago[flagged]
- jtorsella 4y agoI’m going to not engage on the Fauci/covid question (although I think you’re misremembering which subject he was less than forthright about - it was the efficacy of masking, and the dispute you’re talking about didn’t happen until later). But the real point the author is making is that neither “Hero Fauci smashes Rand Paul” nor “Did Fauci visit Wuhan in 2019?” are things that I want on my windows desktop default! Most of the trash isn’t even political, as the author mentions, but when it is political it is always extreme.
- valeg 4y agoThat's why I switched to MX. I don't want to see this garbage pushed on me.
- qbasic_forever 4y agoI stopped using Windows after 7 and every time I have to briefly dip back in or work with a modern Windows machine it just completely floors me that Microsoft does this advertising. It is the most cheap and tacky nonsense, and I agree it's always trashy tabloid news. I honestly think far worse about the Microsoft product teams because deep in the company multiple teams and people all greenlit this idea and decided that yes it's very good and should be shipped. It's god awful and no one stopped it.
- isusycamore 4y agoThe dichotomy of Microsoft focusing on productivity tools, yet putting this garbage in their operating system.
- micromacrofoot 4y agoWe really need to stop letting ads destroy everything, even tabloid-style clickbait news seems to be spreading to sell more of them.
- justin66 4y agoThe ironic thing is, the first thing I had to do on this webpage was click "No Thanks" on a notifications request.
- m3kw9 4y agoYeah it’s showing classic click bait it makes them look like fb
- elboru 4y agoI ignored it by not using the “Search” bar, I simply just never used it. Until recently, when they started showing a colorful drawing on my taskbar that changed depending the current holiday. It was so annoying and distracting, thankfully I had the option to hide the search bar I also hided the useless widget bar.
- varelse 4y ago[dead]
- bioemerl 4y agoEvery last update is adding just a little bit more intrusion, from the news articles, the required user accounts, the updates without asking any form of permission from the user, and more. The only reason, and I mean the only reason, that I continue running it on any of my machines is that software often won't support Linux for edge case situations like VR games. Also performance is just trash. If you've tried to run windows on a non ssd in the last decade, it's an absolute slog. I'm slowly but surely trying to cut this windows software out of my life. This is also making me strongly consider moving off of .net and looking into any alternative I can find for it, which the only real option at this point is probably Kotlin.
- sixothree 4y agoWhat I hate about this is that it pretends to be something else - "light rain starting soon" with a cloud icon. But the result is the weather taking up very little real estate. And on top of that you _can't_ make the weather take up more space. It's always the smallest tile on the page.
- helmholtz 4y agoWhat I don't understand is how _file explorer_ can be so slow. It's visibly lagging between directories, first-opening etc. That's a fundamental part of the OS. I believe there is so much phone-home going on that nothing on Windows is slick anymore.
- Kye 4y agoThis is often a sign of a problem with your file system, or worse, your drive. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/chkdsk?tabs=event-viewer https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administrat... It's not necessarily or often a huge problem, but it's still enough to cause this. I've never had chkdsk fail to fix these little issues.
- weberer 4y ago>This is also making me strongly consider moving off of .net and looking into any alternative I can find for it, which the only real option at this point is probably Kotlin. Even MS themselves moved from their proprietary .NET implementation to .NET Core, which works just fine in Linux. But I'd give a +1 to Kotlin anyway, its a great language. I'm also fond of using Python with Pydantic to enforce type checking.
- CyberDildonics 4y agopigs eat humans (opens in new tab) “far more often than people expect?” Sounds like something I would see on hacker news.
- Diapason 4y agoI actually reported them several times to the Australian TGA (our "FDA") as they were illegally promoting unapproved medical devices. The TGA could not find out any Australian entity to go after so they gave up :/
- badcppdev 4y agoThat's quite pathetic on the part of the TGA.
- Zuiii 4y agoYeah, I'm sure microsoft (the entity showing the ads) has some presence in Australia. Or better yet, sue microsoft proper, get a judgement, and secure and injunction until they comply. If all goes well, the entire government will be forced to switch off from microsoft and use something more reasonable.
- 1970-01-01 4y agoThe invisible elephant in the room is how modifying your hosts file is no longer deemed acceptable. https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-hosts-file-blocking-telemetry-is-now-flagged-as-a-risk/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-h...
- lbriner 4y agoWith the amount of money that MS makes, it is hard to imagine they do this for revenue. Are they trying to be "useful"? At very least, since many of us have enough to concentrate on as Developers, the install should either ask you "do you want loads of crap to read from the news?" or it should be a simple global switch. I think probably as a big company, Microsoft have lost the Bill Gates character who could decide everything in a holistic way and not random groups of people with their own objectives slinging mud at the OS to see what sticks and annoying everyone in the process. How much has been tried and dropped in the last 10-15 years of Windows?
- alden5 4y agoThey're still beholden to shareholders, anything that'll get them more money they'll do, and I'm sure showing ads on 1.4 billion active devices isn't just chump change to them.
- marcodiego 4y agoWindows is an OS. It shouldn't display ANY news.
- rPlayer6554 4y agoThis is why I moved to Mac.
- _gabe_ 4y agoThe irony of this article being posted on a website so littered with garbage ads that I can't reasonably scroll through it without waiting for several seconds at a time for the actual content to load is rich. And then, at the bottom of the article is something called a taboola feed, which looks eerily similar to a tabloid news feed.
- smusamashah 4y agoLinking this comment here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30019307 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30019307 that designers at Microsoft use Mac and have been given more power than they should. This has been the case for a while. I worked on the Windows Desktop Experience Team from Win7-Win10. Starting around Win8, the designers had full control, and most crucially essentially none of the designers use Windows. I spent far too many years of my career sitting in conference rooms explaining to the newest designer (because they seem to rotate every 6-18 months) with a shiny Macbook why various ideas had been tried and failed in usability studies because our users want X, Y, and Z. There are more https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19780566 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19780566
- acedTrex 4y agoThe idea of Windows UI/UX designers having macbooks is so absurd to me it's hilarious
- MikusR 4y agoAt Mozilla designers use iPads and don't use Firefox.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- grouchomarx 4y agotells you everything there is to know
- rrrrrrrrrrrryan 4y agoThat Microsoft's designers don't take their jobs seriously? How on earth could you ever pretend to do you job well without using the product you're designing?
- lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
- theknocker 4y ago[dead]
- raphar 4y agoIt's ironic that tomshardware.com has their site full of same news that they are complaining about. (At least for me).
- Slava_Propanei 4y ago[dead]
- PaulHoule 4y agoMicrosoft has been trying this for a long time and getting slapped back numerous times.
- dawnerd 4y agoThey also need to stop overriding settings each update. I’m tired of removing search from the taskbar.
- quitit 4y agoThis is like some old school prank developers would program in should the software detect it was pirated.
- mbgerring 4y agoThis is why using for me, using Windows is a non-starter. My operating system should not be showing me random crap from the Internet that I can’t turn off, period.
- nativeit 4y agoI couldn’t get through the article because the website crashed twice when I tried to get rid of one of several modular ad windows covering the article’s content. The modern internet is a dumpster fire, even in articles covering the ways in which the modern internet is a dumpster fire.
- ninkendo 4y agoIndeed. To be honest, if I didn’t have reader mode on by default, I don’t think I’d use the web at all unless I had to (aside from sites known to not suck, like this one.) Ad blockers simply aren’t enough any more, reader view is the only way the web works for me at this point. It’s truly sad.
- aendruk 4y agoI gave up when the auto-playing video started following me down the page. I don’t understand how they think such hostility is a good idea. It only makes me despise the site and note never to return. But presumably some people go for it?
- samtho 4y ago>> How can we get more people to watch our videos? > Autoplay it! >> Oh no, they are scrolling away from it now, how do we get them to keep watching it? > literally make it always present on the screen no matter where they have scrolled to! The road to hell, these days, is often paved with marketing OKRs.
- ouid 4y agoparaphrasing >It's ok for windows to push sponsored content because Tom's hardware is sponsored content, but its not ok to push bad sponsored content. I dont understand how you could arrive at this claim. Surely the only reasonable diagnosis of the problem is that Windows is pushing content at all.
- ghostoftiber 4y agoI dunno maybe the author of this article needs to stop googling for taylor swift. non-snark reply: we're once again going to have the "what is fake news" argument again I suppose.
- a_vanderbilt 4y agoI feel that Microsoft sees the writing on the wall when it comes to Windows. The world is going increasingly mobile, and people are doing more and more via their phones (iOS and Android) and ditching the desktop. Your average person isn't computer literate nearly to the degree of the average HN poster, and I think we sometimes forget this. The average person does not care about operating systems. They want something that works and is intuitive. Microsoft is pivoting to a services company for this reason. They have been unable to kill win32, their mobile aspirations have failed, and ARM is coming around the corner for desktop. Windows will not be killed by the competition. It will remain dominant in an ever-diminishing niche, just as the IBM mainframe gave way to PCs.
- donmcronald 4y ago> their mobile aspirations have failed Their mobile aspirations were a walled garden because they wanted in on one of the ecosystems that was good for them at the expense of developers and users. I'm convinced that Microsoft would have a large share of the mobile market today if they would have tried to create a product that was good for users and developers instead of a product that was good for Microsoft.
- a_vanderbilt 4y agoI can agree with that perspective. There is also the cultural element. In America at least, having a Windows Phone was about as uncool as you could get. Capability or price didn't matter, it'd get you socially snubbed. We see something similar playing out now with Android and iOS among under-25s in the U.S.
- thomastjeffery 4y agoMSN should not exist. It's a clear-cut case of vertical integration.
- tracker1 4y agoI switched my main desktop to Linux a bit over a year ago now. I got so sick of the Win11 issues and the advertising just irked me to no end. It's less than perfect, but I'm far more lenient when it comes to a free OS that I can do what I want with.
- charles_f 4y agoI dont use windows search anymore, it's way too slow and imprecise. I use wox and everything instead.
- 999900000999 4y agoAny OS that shoves ads in my face should be free with a no add upgrade option. Just the other day I had to get some bloat ware off a friend's computer since it was making it unusable.
- graypegg 4y agoIf windows had an ad-riddled OEM version, and a Standard “clean” version that you could buy directly from Microsoft, I would consider windows again. Not like there’s actually an incentive for them to do that, but I can dream.
- bob1029 4y agoI would pay 4 figures for a properly un-fucked version of Windows. I don't think its ridiculous to consider a hacker/developer edition in 2023.
- jwcacces 4y agoFour figures for an operating system license? > $1000? Really? Per computer, for just that version of Windows? Can you explain how that could be worth it?
- nobody9999 4y ago>I would pay 4 figures for a properly un-fucked version of Windows. You can buy a Visual Studio (formerly Technet/MSDN) subscription[0] which includes not just Windows clients but servers as well for ~USD$1200. >I don't think its ridiculous to consider a hacker/developer edition in 2023. Which (unless things have changed dramatically in the past few years) is exactly what such a subscription provides. Such a subscription enables access for all current (and many old ones) products and, IIRC, these versions (unless changed from Technet/MSDN) are not consumer versions that allow you to "un-fuck" Windows and you'll have access (need to download ISOs, so storage will be necessary) to just about all of Microsoft's offerings. Which, of course, can be used forever, although I'm guessing that a new subscription every five-ten years or so will update everything you may need. [0] https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/vs/pricing-details/ https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/vs/pricing-details/ Edit: Fixed typo.
- indymike 4y agoThe first thing I remove, disable or brain damage when I get a new device is anything that pumps news into notification. I had a day where I had been cruising along on a new mac, and then the news feed sent me three really gristly rape/murder stories in a row. I went from being on a cloud, getting stuff done to depressed. Incidentally, Apple News is not uninstallable (fortunately, you can disable it) on Mac and it needs to be for mental health reasons.
- oneeyedpigeon 4y agoI have an Apple News app, but I don't think I've ever used it. I don't ever see notifications from it, though — where would these appear? Maybe I've disabled it and/or maybe it's more insidious in later version of the OS (I'm on Big Sur). If macOS ever forces news onto me like that, I'll be moving to Linux.
- indymike 4y agoIt was a later version, and it just started sending notifications (that popped up in the corner) after an update. Not sure what version it was. I've never had something unexpected like that actually get to me the way those news notifications did, and as a result, I've become almost militant about managing notifications. Life is too short to have your day ruined by some product manager/growth manager trying to get clicks to earn an extra $2,000 bonus.
- resters 4y agoIt's truly unbelievable that Microsoft has allowed low quality garbage news to proliferate the Windows UI, including generating notifications. It's really quite embarrassing to see the low quality content and to imagine that somewhere within Microsoft a human actually made the decision to allow this content to flourish within the OS. My guess is that there is some product manager at Microsoft who has a bunch of friends who are creating the interfaces and garbage content generation "news" feeds and they are simply milking this for profit before it gets turned off.
- malikNF 4y agoUse linux. Its free.
- ofchnofc 4y agoHN, literally "Hacker News" where people will spend (not an exaggeration) a decade complaining about Windows and macOS issues, with all sorts of workarounds, homebrew, homebrew workarounds and more, and yet still offer up their Ubuntu 18.04 experiences as if they're indicative of where Desktop Linux is today. I have auto ZFS snapshots, the choice of 5+ competent desktop environments, every piece of software I need and use (including Halo, emulators, etc), an immutable OS, rollbacks to nearly any point in time, have never, ever, ever had anything "break", and have never remotely seen an advertisement or nagware, ever. Not to mention that my NixOS skills directly translate to running servers the way they're meant to be run. With my recently setup zrepl, I also have an exact replica of all of my data on a portable SSD. I can travel with a single laptop and know that I can literally get it back to its identical state in about 15 minutes, should it ever be broken or stolen. Entire classes of anxieties eliminated in a way that other OSes can't even dream of, on top of complete control, and again no nagware. It's about tradeoffs and I'd much rather put up some up front investment and then never think about it again. Go re-install Windows and watch how long it takes to disable all the telemetry, un-privacy features, default browsers, application and desktop configuration, etc. And then realize for maybe 3x that cost, you could learn something new and move past all of this nonsense. Or just keep dealing with Windows Updates and Bing shoved everywhere it doesn't belong.
- schemescape 4y agoContrast the distracting tabloid news by default with Microsoft’s mission statement: > Our mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. Seems like a fail to me…
- spandrew 4y agoThe search bar just magically showing up in my version of Windows 11 was annoying enough. I haven't actually ever clicked on it. But to know clicking on it would bring me the type of news that attacks my peace of mind is just too far. I did notice some dark pattern bs in the Windows menu with the search bar looking like a system search, but it providing web search results. Does Microsoft think this is endearing them to anyone as a product?
- marcod 4y agoThat's a very long article for > right clicking on the search box and unchecking Search -> Show Search Highlights.
- ultra_nick 4y agoOk, switched to Linux. What's the best way to help improve the Linux Desktop experience?
- davycro 4y agoI use windows when I work in the emergency department. These ads drive me bonkers when I’m trying to use the software to take care of patients.
- slugiscool99 4y agoThey are still so tasteless it's insane
- sleepybrett 4y agoWindows can only display the news that microsoft is willing to purchase. Since they don't have a subscription service for news like apple+ you get what is basically free or places that just want to 'work for exposure'.
- dspillett 4y agoDo they purchase it, or is it a small revenue stream for them from the “news” outlets paying to get eyeballs passed their way? That would explain much of it being tacky lowest common-denominator click-bait crap (better reporting wouldn't get much traction in those spots as the target audience are more likely to ignore it or find a way to turn it off).
- mzmzmzm 4y agoImmediately on a new Windows install, I always rush to group policy to disable certain creepy and distracting features: Cortana, Widgets, OneDrive (I pay for a different cloud service), Xbox Game Bar, etc. Hopping on other machines I'm oftern struck by how janky and unusable Windows is by default. Lately I've noticed that the "new features" for feature updates tend to focus on add-ons like widgets rather than core functionality or stability, in other words Windows is more stagnant for me. Increasingly I'm considering linux despite using Windows for work (Adobe apps) and gaming... for the latter I recently purchased MS Flight Simulator without realizing an MS account is required. I'm not sure if I will try to play it or not.
- yabones 4y agoI find it funny that it took them the entire lifespan of Windows 10 to finish moving everything from Control Panel to the 'Settings' app.
- beaugunderson 4y agoThere are still things only in Control Panel though!
- thomastjeffery 4y agoNotably, the ability to set a default (and enable/disable) audio device. Inevitably, windows will decide to make HDMI/DP the default output. And the ability to change the gain on your mic: cheap mics are way too quiet in windows, especially in discord.
- mzmzmzm 4y agoYep plenty! You go to Network & internet > Related > More network adapter options and it might as well be Vista. Go to Mouse settings and want to turn off pointer precision or hide while typing? That's only in the Win32 panel. Plenty more. It's almost bizarre how much fwature parity wasn't a goal for UX and power users get the worst of both experience.
- 4y ago
- jdlyga 4y agoMicrosoft needs to declutter. Windows and Edge are starting to feel like a very disorganized junk drawer.
- hot_gril 4y agoDon't waste your breath complaining about Windows. Microsoft isn't listening.
- LeoPanthera 4y agoApple News is not quite as bad, but does have a similar problem. I very rarely use it just because of the sheer amount of clickbait that it wants me to read. There seems to be no way to say "just show me actual news only, please". At least it is silo'd away into its own app, and not part of the OS UI, unlike Windows.
- EntropyDenied 4y agoOn Windows 11. Taskbar Settings -> Personalization -> Turn Widgets off. Problem solved.
- cosmin800 4y agoI think people should stop trying to use the windows malware as an OS.
- midjji 4y agoThis is the way skype died, sure appears like they haven't learned their lesson.
- sizzle 4y agoThis has also been bothering me on my work machine. I can’t believe Microsoft is getting away with peddling this tabloid news spam during work hours on corporate machines
- djha-skin 4y agoIt's that age old business model repeating itself again: 1. Service provider provides good service, but charges for it 2. Service provided becomes commoditized; cheap, easy to get 3. Service provider bottom line decreases 4. Service provider supplements service revenue with ad revenue Cable TV was a notable example of this pattern. Now it's happening to MS Windows.
- zeruch 4y agoIt needs to stop showing a lot of things, including its own ass. The "Microsoft’s MSN content network, which syndicates content from hundreds of web publishers: some reputable, some less so" is drastic in its understatement, and MSFT cant even make anything these days without adding telemetry on one side and "content" noise on the other straight out of a Philip K Dick fever dream.
- donkeydoug 4y agosame for Google News... I hate having news customized based on what you assume my interests are and considering a bunch of shitty sources as relevant. Like you figured out I like marvel movies, way to go... hard pass on rumors and theories about plots. Hey I watched some youtube videos about the economy... guess it's time for the news to gaslight me for a few months and show anything that might spark fear of things outside my control.
- masswerk 4y agoRetaliate: if someone is known as MS middle management, invest a short 20 minutes reading MDN news to them, before answering any questions or requests. (This shouldn't cause any annoyance, are they apparently deem this fine behavior.) ;-)
- throwaheyy 4y agoI work at Microsoft. This shit, along with “shopping toolbars” and “BNPL” in the Edge browser, is frankly embarrassing.
- euix 4y agoThe advances Steam has made to linux gaming has really brought alot of people over to permanent linux - including myself. Before I used to still have a dual boot system but for the last 3 years there hasn't been a Windows computer in my residence and I can honestly say I don't miss a thing. Even things like Microsoft Teams or Visual Code, skype, which are good utility products from Microsoft have Linux versions or are accessible from the browser. The only use for Windows I can see is in Enterprise corporate settings.
- yellow_lead 4y agoI think gaming + adobe suite are the biggest for me also. Listening if anyone has recommendations for the latter (I use darktable already, but Premiere is tough to replace)
- irq-1 4y agoCan't recommend it enough: O&O ShutUp10++ https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10 https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10 Not open but free of charge and effective!
- mikaeluman 4y agoIt's to the point that it's embarrassing to use in a professional setting. You are sharing your screen and suddenly you access the stupid "news" menu, popping up with tabloid and perhaps the weather at best. I try my best to use this software and disable what I can, but after an update to the OS or Edge you have to reconfigure stuff, and suddenly it has added back some horrible defaults. Okay, it's "free" I guess.
- honkycat 4y agoi've had multiple issues where graphic photographs appeared on my news pop-up thing during meetings. it really pisses me off.
- tacoman 4y agoThey've been doing this for almost decade. The last straw for me was when they decided to put the smiling face of a murdered woman in my start menu. It was just so bizarre. https://ibb.co/M8Y7gvj https://ibb.co/M8Y7gvj
- magwa101 4y agoI have Power Toys installed and start everything via PT. <cmd>spacebar "application name", just like the old quicksilver which was amazing (for mac). PT is great...but crashes an FT.
- throwaway128128 4y agoThe path of least resistance for middle of the road Internet users is to become dumb as fuck. Our society has no standards for critical thinking or epistemology.
- lowlevel 4y agoSo 2 hours to figure out there is no way to disable the news other than turn off the whole widget thing.... my computer is rebooing constantly with intrusive unauthorized updates and even firmware updates... everything is broken. Windows just disappear everywhere... oh there was a glitch sign in again... You know, Windows 7 worked pretty good. I think I'll go back.
- sacnoradhq 4y agoYou can be your bottom dollar that every such tabloid news is about getting eyeballs generating impressions on chumbox ads. Can we not outlaw deceptive chumbox ads and make this cancer of poor quality gossip "news" for-profit disappear?
- thewileyone 4y agoI don't get it. You can just turn off the news and ads, even uninstall MS News.
- stefek99 4y agoFirefox is guilty of the same thing. I was spinnign some VM in the cloud and I was WTF Firefox showing me all this crap on the homepage.