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It's not recent. Piracy has been a promotional channel for Windows for a long time. When you use Windows, you don't use the alternatives, don't consider the al

It's not recent. Piracy has been a promotional channel for Windows for a long time. When you use Windows, you don't use the alternatives, don't consider the alternatives, and don't change your habits, which makes one even more inclined to stick to Windows. That's why Microsoft is careful to not make it too hard to acquire a copy of Windows. (On the other hand, it makes it hard for hardware makers to offer anything else, and for businesses to switch or elude.) A regular user doesn't care about the OS anyway, and would follow any shepherd. As a wrapper to run browser and multimedia player, Linux was ready for desktop long ago — see famous anti-Linux stunts at Microsoft. Moreover, the leaders today don't profit from software, they profit from data collection and control over their “free” services. The bigger the user numbers, the more money you can get, and when Windows activation can be done by typing some commands on a vanilla system, it is effectively “free” for everyone who wants to take it.

oohffyvfg 3y ago
everyone can download windows 11 today, install, and never even activate. you will see "not activated" or something on the bottom right. and you cannot change theme (you can still change it before you go online the first time, or via registry)
_chu1 3y ago
The average user probably isn't reinstalling their OS anyways. They don't even really have to rely on this method anymore because I was born in 2008 and grew up with Windows. It actually kind of blew my mind when I realized all *nixes were case sensitive and that they didn't have the dir and cd commands by default, all I knew was how Windows did things and I'm still pretty used to it, as much as I wish I could trust it more but I've tried to lock down my main version (LTSC IoT 2021) as much as possible from MS data collection.
- notpushkin 3y ago
  nixes do actually have a cd command. I see your point though, I think the reason I'm on Linux now (well, currently macOS actually) is that I've switched way back in middle school or so. Still, I think Windows nowadays is hostile towards both nix and old-time Windows users. I kinda wish ReactOS was more active so that people who are tied to Windows ecosystem have some sane alternative.

oohffyvfg 3y ago

everyone can download windows 11 today, install, and never even activate. you will see "not activated" or something on the bottom right. and you cannot change theme (you can still change it before you go online the first time, or via registry)

_chu1 3y ago

The average user probably isn't reinstalling their OS anyways. They don't even really have to rely on this method anymore because I was born in 2008 and grew up with Windows. It actually kind of blew my mind when I realized all *nixes were case sensitive and that they didn't have the dir and cd commands by default, all I knew was how Windows did things and I'm still pretty used to it, as much as I wish I could trust it more but I've tried to lock down my main version (LTSC IoT 2021) as much as possible from MS data collection.

notpushkin 3y ago
nixes do actually have a cd command. I see your point though, I think the reason I'm on Linux now (well, currently macOS actually) is that I've switched way back in middle school or so. Still, I think Windows nowadays is hostile towards both nix and old-time Windows users. I kinda wish ReactOS was more active so that people who are tied to Windows ecosystem have some sane alternative.