9 ms·

A long long time ago as a poor college student, I signed up to get a “free PC.” You got a shitty packard bell tower for signing away your privacy and allowing a

A long long time ago as a poor college student, I signed up to get a “free PC.” You got a shitty packard bell tower for signing away your privacy and allowing a bunch of ads annd telemetry exist in the OS. It really wasn’t that intrusive and eventually the company folded and I got a free (shitty) ad-free pc out of it. I’m a Mac user now but when I pull up windows 11 on my kid’s or wife’s laptop, it feels like that free-pc dot com again, only it’s in every person’s PC. I’m genuinely shocked at the amount of trash that barrages a common user in windows, and shocked that Microsoft gets away with it. My 14 year old gets barraged with not just co-pilot but a bunch of news and trash clickbait that is straight inappropriate for kids to see. I’ve had to remove it all twice but with every significant update, somehow my settings get reversed and we’re back at square one. I tried even using local accounts but it causes significant issues in the OS. If you’d told me in 1999 that free-pc.com was the dystopian digital future we’d all be living in, I’d have laughed you out of the room - but that’s exactly what we have. The only difference is that the PC isn’t free. We are.

jb1991 2y ago
Not only do I agree with you, I actually think you have sugarcoated it.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- cvadict 2y ago
  Speaking of sugar coatings, have you tried Candy Crush Saga 365 yet? I've already pinned it in your start menu favorites for convenience.
- throwup238 2y ago
  Agreed on the sugarcoating. My mother installed Windows 11 on a lab computer and had to call me for tech support for the first time in 20 years because she couldn't figure out how to do the most basic things. This is a PhD physicist who has been programming Fortran and Python since the 1990s and taught her parents how to use Ubuntu as their daily driver, yet she was completely stumped by Windows 11. It's been a daily struggle for her since. Sadly all I could say was "yeah, that's why I use Linux"
  - ragnese 2y ago
    I'm so sorry that your poor mother had to install Windows on a lab computer. I'm guessing there was a specific piece of hardware in the lab that only works with some shitty Windows-only control software, huh?
    - SauciestGNU 2y ago
      Oh boy, I got my career start doing laboratory instrument IT. Some vendors have great software (Agilent), but lots of them are real stinkers.
  - CydeWeys 2y ago
    It seems like it's just a part of aging, sadly. My dad was using computers at MIT back in the 60s before hardly anyone else had ever seen one. I had access to a computer at home my entire life even though the most basic monochrome green PC compatible was $10k in today's money [1], and I remember him using an acoustic coupler modem to connect to some network (a BBS?) at triple digit baud through the actual telephone handset, long before the World Wide Web even existed. And yet now ... he barely does anything with computers besides play freemium mobile games on his phone. Doesn't email too much anymore, doesn't have online logins to just about anything (like his bank accounts), and can't handle basic debugging of tech issues anymore. I think people just give up at some point and stop trying to stay current with this stuff. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compaq_Portable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compaq_Portable
    - SoftTalker 2y ago
      > I think people just give up at some point and stop trying to stay current with this stuff. Or, they realize that 90% of it adds zero value to their lives. When you get older, you really do start thinking about how fast the years went by and how they are going to be gone before you know it, and do you want to spend any significant fraction of that time sitting at a computer, yet again wasting hours on "debugging tech issues" that a 20-something developer in California or Oregon has yet again foisted upon the world. Also as you get older you have figured out that if you don't want to do something, you just pretend you don't know how, and eventually someone else will do it for you.
jacobwilliamroy 2y ago
I just don't have a personal computer. I just use other people's computers. Accept all cookies. Honestly if advertisers can figure out how to track me across multiple browsers on multiple OSes on multiple computers on multiple networks, then that's actually really impressive and I would like to know how they did it.
- giantg2 2y ago
  If you log into any sites, there's a good chance they can link you together.
- ragnese 2y ago
  That's also something Richard Stallman said he used to do, IIRC. He said that while he didn't browse the web on his own computers, he would sometimes do it on other peoples' computers or public computers. No point being made. Just an interesting tidbit I remembered.
criley2 2y ago
The way we use algorithms to pump offensive fake news content to everyone is shocking. It's no secret that Meta (facebook/instagram) pushes sexual content to minors and I think Meta may be the organization pushing the most sexual content to children in human history. And yet, we just ignore it? The news sources that get pumped into Windows are similarly as bad. Celebrity sexual content, openly fake political propaganda, scare mongering nonsense, just truly depraved garbage. I don't understand how these organizations reputations survive this. They're not just polluting our own systems with their depraved content, they're intentionally* targeting children with wildly inappropriate sexual content. This might seem radical but I think there should be severe criminal penalties for corporate executives who allow this kind of thing to happen. Until billionaires are truly brought to justice for the media hellscape they design to pad their billions, we will be completely at their mercy. I harbor few good feelings towards China and their system but they know how to disappear a billionaire who is "too big to be good" and magically the same services' algorithms don't push sexual content to children there. Tiktok* has a completely different algorithm and pushes completely different content. Maybe they figured it out.
Sharlin 2y ago
I’m not quite sure why there hasn’t been more regulationary or legislative pushback to MS’s antics this time. One would expect the EU at least to not have a very favorable view on this stuff.
- superultra 2y ago
  I think it's a combination of two things - one is that we are in a monopoly friendly environment gilded age for business that was not there in the 90s, and two is that MS was an easy target in the 90s because they were really the only target. But if you're the US government, if you go after MS you have to go after like 6 other companies for effectively doing the same thing even if it's not OS level. It's just not possible. Digital business has won by deluge. I mean, throwing co-pilot into everything is literally the 2024 version of inlcuding IE on everything in the 90s and MS does it with impunity because they can.
giantg2 2y ago
The clean install seems fine to me, as long as you turn off all the data collection toggles during setup. It seems like the bigger issue are the manufacturers shipping with all sorts of junk on it. It surprises me that Norton and McAfee are still shipping pre-installed.
- consf 2y ago
  Many intrusive features are enabled by default, and casual users may not be aware of how to disable them, leading to widespread acceptance by default.
  - giantg2 2y ago
    Such as? More specifically, what intrusive features are enabled that aren't shown as an option to deselect on a clean install?
- tracker1 2y ago
  You don't have a Candy Crush or Office 365 shortcuts out of the box? edit: I mean they had to remove Solitaire and Minesweeper to save space...
  - giantg2 2y ago
    Mine's "pro", so that might be why I don't have games. I would assume it has Office 365 installed (I haven't checked), just as it has OneDrive, Cortana, Defender, etc.
  - gaius_baltar 2y ago
    > edit: I mean they had to remove Solitaire and Minesweeper to save space... Don't worry, you can still install Minesweeper from the official store ... with ads and play-to-win microtransactions. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40647278 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40647278
    - tracker1 2y ago
consf 2y ago
[dead]
kmacdough 2y ago
Unsurprising. MS has never been innovative. They just bully, buy out and patent troll competition. Every product they buy they immediately trash the freedom and, soon after, the entire experience. If you have the freedom to use your PC as you please, they can't force their software down your throat. They know that means no one will lock into their software because it sucks.
ycombinator_acc 2y ago
I'll take a few ads over the illogical mess that is MacOS. To make your settings stick, use group policies instead of Control Panel, Settings and the registry. It's the much more stable and better documented equivalent of MacOS' "defaults." > I tried even using local accounts but it causes significant issues in the OS. I have never not used a local account, so I'm unsure what you're saying, because it hasn't caused any issues at all, let alone significant ones. Can you provide an example?
- slowmovintarget 2y ago
  MacOS when seen through the lens of iTerm2 is actually pretty great. brew install theThingIActuallyWant ...and you're off. Settings for notifications and obnoxious start-up stuff, all in one place and in your hands, not Microsoft's and in most cases, not even Apple's. It is better than Windows. Linux, with complete user control, is better. It has rough edges, still, but your computer is your own. MacOS is the better of the two consumer offerings. Windows is now the sleaziest of all, and I'm sad about that. I've been a gamer and PC enthusiast for more than 40 years. I've used Windows since there was a Windows, and MS-DOS before that. My first "real" computer was an IBM XT clone running MS-DOS 3.3. I went to the store for every upgrade. Microsoft Bob was the first thing I passed on, but I've used all the others. I was beyond excited for Windows 95, I ran NT, and all of it's variants. I loved Windows 2000. ME, 7, 8, 10... I still have licenses. I won't touch 11. I've switched to Linux on my desktop, and won't be going back. I use Macs for work, and for the family PC. Microsoft Office is still the best office suite out there, but I'll run it on Mac or through Bottles on Linux. I won't let Windows on my hardware anymore if I can help it.
  - ycombinator_acc 2y ago
    > `brew install theThingIActuallyWant` Homebrew is a third-party tool neither written nor endorsed by Apple that does hacky things and causes breakage with things as simple and fundamental as a [multi user install]. > Settings for notifications and obnoxious start-up stuff, all in one place and in your hands, not Microsoft's and in most cases, not even Apple's. It is better than Windows. Right-click on Start - Task Manager - Startup apps. Right-click on notification icon - Notifications settings. I am not "off." You just don't know Windows. I know MacOS with all its illogical UX. No idea why you brought up Linux. It's [less secure] than both macOS and Windows and much less secure than Android and iOS, so I wouldn't use it as a desktop OS to begin with, and it's not really relevant to the discussion. [multi user install]: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/41840479/how-to-use-homebrew-on-a-multi-user-macos-sierra-setup https://stackoverflow.com/questions/41840479/how-to-use-home... [less secure]: https://madaidans-insecurities.github.io/linux.html https://madaidans-insecurities.github.io/linux.html
Delk 2y ago
> I tried even using local accounts but it causes significant issues in the OS. Which kinds of issues? Honest question. I don't use Windows 11 a lot on my personal laptop but I set it up with a local account and haven't noticed any major issues in my limited use. I don't use OneDrive or other MS services on it, though.
- jzzskijj 2y ago
  I am curious to learn too about this. I have managed to say at Windows 10 with strictly local accounts only.
- giantg2 2y ago
  Same here, I'm using a Win11 local account. I haven't had any issues yet, but I've haven't been using it very much. I also don't use things like OneDrive.
jakub_g 2y ago
It feels like MS has decided a few years ago there can only be one premium, quality vendor (Apple) and they give up and go the way of enshittification instead to get their $$$. Writing this as a die-hard anti-Apple person, and I was one of a few Windows-based developers in my prev job (there are a few tools on Windows I liked that didn't have good counterparts on other platforms), but seeing where things are going, and having worked on a MBP for last few years, I'm not going back to Windows.
- hollerith 2y ago
  And they've only started trying to stuff AI down our throats.
ca_tech 2y ago
Your point is interesting because I see this across the home hardware industry. Cheap electronics were subsidized by data collection and I suppose that market was lucrative until it wasn't. It happened behind the scenes, we knew it was going on, but it was abstracted away enough that we did not think about it. Now what is happening is that the hardware providers are getting into the marketing game directly. Personally in the past year I've given up on two pieces of hardware Alexa and Roku because they have morphed into ad machines. The market is open for privacy, convenience, and quality. Unfortunately, Apple seems to be the only major player in that space right now and we are paying their premium.
- gigel82 2y ago
  Apple is already one of the largest ad companies in the world and they are clearly working very hard to get bigger($10.34 billion ad revenue in 2023). Sure, they're great at PR and marketing themselves as "private" but they're just as bad as the rest of them. Also fan boys, I'd be willing to bet if Apple launches a "private personalized ad platform", the fanboys will be singing its praise instead of being appalled.
  - Terretta 2y ago
    > Sure, they're great at PR and marketing themselves as "private" but they're just as bad as the rest of them. Apple's $10B of ad revenue primarily comes from promoting apps within its App Store, similar to how grocery stores charge for premium shelf space or end-of-aisle displays. This is an in-store, first-party system where data collected is used exclusively within Apple's ecosystem to personalize the user experience. These ads aim to increase app visibility within the App Store, maintaining a controlled and private "first party" environment. In contrast, Google’s $300B advertising ecosystem extends far beyond its own platforms, surveilling and tracking user behavior across millions of websites and even physical locations. Google integrates with 85% of credit card transactions in the U.S., creating extensive user profiles that feed into a global ad tech and data brokering network with thousands of data brokers. This system supports highly targeted ads that follow users across the internet and beyond, typically sending users to third-party sites and services. The difference lies in the scope and method of data collection and usage: Apple’s approach is about, and data remains within, its ecosystem, while Google’s extends to pervasive cross-platform tracking and profiling. > if Apple launches a "private personalized ad platform", the fanboys will be singing its praise This is indeed likely, since as an example, Apple spends extra time and energy to prevent even themselves from getting data, such as how they break up your Apple Maps trips directions requests into anonymized segments, to avoid letting themselves capture users' full trips. Apple deliberately makes their own data use more difficult, and in some cases makes certain uses impossible for themselves, to serve users' privacy. When you look at Alphabet or Meta engineering, you see their schemes serve to give them the ad profile data, while making it inaccessible to competitors. TL;DR: For both ad platforms and privacy engineering, as the Gus Fring meme goes, these "are not the same".
jollyllama 2y ago
What's baffling to me is how this is acceptable to enterprise customers. Your "free PC" was acceptable to you as a poor student, but would never have been acceptable to them. Now, most of this bloatware remains on millions of work PCs.
- itsyaboi 2y ago
  ltsc
- jjnoakes 2y ago
  Any enterprise install I've ever used has the annoying stuff removed. Small businesses are most likely the ones suffering though.
  - ActionHank 2y ago
    This is exactly it. They know that their home users have likely used and learned about Windows through work. These users see it as the only professional, best in market option.
  - jollyllama 2y ago
    I guess it depends on the quality of your IT department. I've seen large companies that are handing out laptops with the candy crush, etc. News in the search bar. Lots of distractions.
- CydeWeys 2y ago
  Enterprise customers aren't dealing with this BS. They get good Windows, not available to the rest of us :(
  - munk-a 2y ago
    Even enterprise windows versions don't have a side-dockable taskbar. Microsoft really seems to be begging to be out-competed lately.
    - 2y ago
DEADMINCE 2y ago
> I’ve had to remove it all twice but with every significant update, somehow my settings get reversed and we’re back at square one. You're not removing it properly. After I setup my first install of W10 nothing has ever been changed or reverted after any update.
- DEADMINCE 2y ago
  Downvoted, but the fact remains. If your settings revert after every update, you didn't tame W10 properly. So those people downvoting likely have some reading to do, or they can downvote and keep feeling hurt and keep fixing their installs every couple of months.

jb1991 2y ago

Not only do I agree with you, I actually think you have sugarcoated it.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
cvadict 2y ago
Speaking of sugar coatings, have you tried Candy Crush Saga 365 yet? I've already pinned it in your start menu favorites for convenience.
throwup238 2y ago
Agreed on the sugarcoating. My mother installed Windows 11 on a lab computer and had to call me for tech support for the first time in 20 years because she couldn't figure out how to do the most basic things. This is a PhD physicist who has been programming Fortran and Python since the 1990s and taught her parents how to use Ubuntu as their daily driver, yet she was completely stumped by Windows 11. It's been a daily struggle for her since. Sadly all I could say was "yeah, that's why I use Linux"
- ragnese 2y ago
  I'm so sorry that your poor mother had to install Windows on a lab computer. I'm guessing there was a specific piece of hardware in the lab that only works with some shitty Windows-only control software, huh?
  - SauciestGNU 2y ago
    Oh boy, I got my career start doing laboratory instrument IT. Some vendors have great software (Agilent), but lots of them are real stinkers.
- CydeWeys 2y ago
  It seems like it's just a part of aging, sadly. My dad was using computers at MIT back in the 60s before hardly anyone else had ever seen one. I had access to a computer at home my entire life even though the most basic monochrome green PC compatible was $10k in today's money [1], and I remember him using an acoustic coupler modem to connect to some network (a BBS?) at triple digit baud through the actual telephone handset, long before the World Wide Web even existed. And yet now ... he barely does anything with computers besides play freemium mobile games on his phone. Doesn't email too much anymore, doesn't have online logins to just about anything (like his bank accounts), and can't handle basic debugging of tech issues anymore. I think people just give up at some point and stop trying to stay current with this stuff. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compaq_Portable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compaq_Portable
  - SoftTalker 2y ago
    > I think people just give up at some point and stop trying to stay current with this stuff. Or, they realize that 90% of it adds zero value to their lives. When you get older, you really do start thinking about how fast the years went by and how they are going to be gone before you know it, and do you want to spend any significant fraction of that time sitting at a computer, yet again wasting hours on "debugging tech issues" that a 20-something developer in California or Oregon has yet again foisted upon the world. Also as you get older you have figured out that if you don't want to do something, you just pretend you don't know how, and eventually someone else will do it for you.

jacobwilliamroy 2y ago

I just don't have a personal computer. I just use other people's computers. Accept all cookies. Honestly if advertisers can figure out how to track me across multiple browsers on multiple OSes on multiple computers on multiple networks, then that's actually really impressive and I would like to know how they did it.

giantg2 2y ago
If you log into any sites, there's a good chance they can link you together.
ragnese 2y ago
That's also something Richard Stallman said he used to do, IIRC. He said that while he didn't browse the web on his own computers, he would sometimes do it on other peoples' computers or public computers. No point being made. Just an interesting tidbit I remembered.

criley2 2y ago

The way we use algorithms to pump offensive fake news content to everyone is shocking. It's no secret that Meta (facebook/instagram) pushes sexual content to minors and I think Meta may be the organization pushing the most sexual content to children in human history. And yet, we just ignore it? The news sources that get pumped into Windows are similarly as bad. Celebrity sexual content, openly fake political propaganda, scare mongering nonsense, just truly depraved garbage. I don't understand how these organizations reputations survive this. They're not just polluting our own systems with their depraved content, they're intentionally* targeting children with wildly inappropriate sexual content. This might seem radical but I think there should be severe criminal penalties for corporate executives who allow this kind of thing to happen. Until billionaires are truly brought to justice for the media hellscape they design to pad their billions, we will be completely at their mercy. I harbor few good feelings towards China and their system but they know how to disappear a billionaire who is "too big to be good" and magically the same services' algorithms don't push sexual content to children there. Tiktok* has a completely different algorithm and pushes completely different content. Maybe they figured it out.

Sharlin 2y ago

I’m not quite sure why there hasn’t been more regulationary or legislative pushback to MS’s antics this time. One would expect the EU at least to not have a very favorable view on this stuff.

superultra 2y ago
I think it's a combination of two things - one is that we are in a monopoly friendly environment gilded age for business that was not there in the 90s, and two is that MS was an easy target in the 90s because they were really the only target. But if you're the US government, if you go after MS you have to go after like 6 other companies for effectively doing the same thing even if it's not OS level. It's just not possible. Digital business has won by deluge. I mean, throwing co-pilot into everything is literally the 2024 version of inlcuding IE on everything in the 90s and MS does it with impunity because they can.

giantg2 2y ago

The clean install seems fine to me, as long as you turn off all the data collection toggles during setup. It seems like the bigger issue are the manufacturers shipping with all sorts of junk on it. It surprises me that Norton and McAfee are still shipping pre-installed.

consf 2y ago
Many intrusive features are enabled by default, and casual users may not be aware of how to disable them, leading to widespread acceptance by default.
- giantg2 2y ago
  Such as? More specifically, what intrusive features are enabled that aren't shown as an option to deselect on a clean install?
tracker1 2y ago
You don't have a Candy Crush or Office 365 shortcuts out of the box? edit: I mean they had to remove Solitaire and Minesweeper to save space...
- giantg2 2y ago
  Mine's "pro", so that might be why I don't have games. I would assume it has Office 365 installed (I haven't checked), just as it has OneDrive, Cortana, Defender, etc.
- gaius_baltar 2y ago
  > edit: I mean they had to remove Solitaire and Minesweeper to save space... Don't worry, you can still install Minesweeper from the official store ... with ads and play-to-win microtransactions. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40647278 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40647278
  - tracker1 2y ago

consf 2y ago

[dead]

kmacdough 2y ago

Unsurprising. MS has never been innovative. They just bully, buy out and patent troll competition. Every product they buy they immediately trash the freedom and, soon after, the entire experience. If you have the freedom to use your PC as you please, they can't force their software down your throat. They know that means no one will lock into their software because it sucks.

ycombinator_acc 2y ago

I'll take a few ads over the illogical mess that is MacOS. To make your settings stick, use group policies instead of Control Panel, Settings and the registry. It's the much more stable and better documented equivalent of MacOS' "defaults." > I tried even using local accounts but it causes significant issues in the OS. I have never not used a local account, so I'm unsure what you're saying, because it hasn't caused any issues at all, let alone significant ones. Can you provide an example?

slowmovintarget 2y ago
MacOS when seen through the lens of iTerm2 is actually pretty great. brew install theThingIActuallyWant ...and you're off. Settings for notifications and obnoxious start-up stuff, all in one place and in your hands, not Microsoft's and in most cases, not even Apple's. It is better than Windows. Linux, with complete user control, is better. It has rough edges, still, but your computer is your own. MacOS is the better of the two consumer offerings. Windows is now the sleaziest of all, and I'm sad about that. I've been a gamer and PC enthusiast for more than 40 years. I've used Windows since there was a Windows, and MS-DOS before that. My first "real" computer was an IBM XT clone running MS-DOS 3.3. I went to the store for every upgrade. Microsoft Bob was the first thing I passed on, but I've used all the others. I was beyond excited for Windows 95, I ran NT, and all of it's variants. I loved Windows 2000. ME, 7, 8, 10... I still have licenses. I won't touch 11. I've switched to Linux on my desktop, and won't be going back. I use Macs for work, and for the family PC. Microsoft Office is still the best office suite out there, but I'll run it on Mac or through Bottles on Linux. I won't let Windows on my hardware anymore if I can help it.
- ycombinator_acc 2y ago
  > `brew install theThingIActuallyWant` Homebrew is a third-party tool neither written nor endorsed by Apple that does hacky things and causes breakage with things as simple and fundamental as a [multi user install]. > Settings for notifications and obnoxious start-up stuff, all in one place and in your hands, not Microsoft's and in most cases, not even Apple's. It is better than Windows. Right-click on Start - Task Manager - Startup apps. Right-click on notification icon - Notifications settings. I am not "off." You just don't know Windows. I know MacOS with all its illogical UX. No idea why you brought up Linux. It's [less secure] than both macOS and Windows and much less secure than Android and iOS, so I wouldn't use it as a desktop OS to begin with, and it's not really relevant to the discussion. [multi user install]: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/41840479/how-to-use-homebrew-on-a-multi-user-macos-sierra-setup https://stackoverflow.com/questions/41840479/how-to-use-home... [less secure]: https://madaidans-insecurities.github.io/linux.html https://madaidans-insecurities.github.io/linux.html

Delk 2y ago

> I tried even using local accounts but it causes significant issues in the OS. Which kinds of issues? Honest question. I don't use Windows 11 a lot on my personal laptop but I set it up with a local account and haven't noticed any major issues in my limited use. I don't use OneDrive or other MS services on it, though.

jzzskijj 2y ago
I am curious to learn too about this. I have managed to say at Windows 10 with strictly local accounts only.
giantg2 2y ago
Same here, I'm using a Win11 local account. I haven't had any issues yet, but I've haven't been using it very much. I also don't use things like OneDrive.

jakub_g 2y ago

It feels like MS has decided a few years ago there can only be one premium, quality vendor (Apple) and they give up and go the way of enshittification instead to get their $$$. Writing this as a die-hard anti-Apple person, and I was one of a few Windows-based developers in my prev job (there are a few tools on Windows I liked that didn't have good counterparts on other platforms), but seeing where things are going, and having worked on a MBP for last few years, I'm not going back to Windows.

hollerith 2y ago
And they've only started trying to stuff AI down our throats.

ca_tech 2y ago

Your point is interesting because I see this across the home hardware industry. Cheap electronics were subsidized by data collection and I suppose that market was lucrative until it wasn't. It happened behind the scenes, we knew it was going on, but it was abstracted away enough that we did not think about it. Now what is happening is that the hardware providers are getting into the marketing game directly. Personally in the past year I've given up on two pieces of hardware Alexa and Roku because they have morphed into ad machines. The market is open for privacy, convenience, and quality. Unfortunately, Apple seems to be the only major player in that space right now and we are paying their premium.

gigel82 2y ago
Apple is already one of the largest ad companies in the world and they are clearly working very hard to get bigger($10.34 billion ad revenue in 2023). Sure, they're great at PR and marketing themselves as "private" but they're just as bad as the rest of them. Also fan boys, I'd be willing to bet if Apple launches a "private personalized ad platform", the fanboys will be singing its praise instead of being appalled.
- Terretta 2y ago
  > Sure, they're great at PR and marketing themselves as "private" but they're just as bad as the rest of them. Apple's $10B of ad revenue primarily comes from promoting apps within its App Store, similar to how grocery stores charge for premium shelf space or end-of-aisle displays. This is an in-store, first-party system where data collected is used exclusively within Apple's ecosystem to personalize the user experience. These ads aim to increase app visibility within the App Store, maintaining a controlled and private "first party" environment. In contrast, Google’s $300B advertising ecosystem extends far beyond its own platforms, surveilling and tracking user behavior across millions of websites and even physical locations. Google integrates with 85% of credit card transactions in the U.S., creating extensive user profiles that feed into a global ad tech and data brokering network with thousands of data brokers. This system supports highly targeted ads that follow users across the internet and beyond, typically sending users to third-party sites and services. The difference lies in the scope and method of data collection and usage: Apple’s approach is about, and data remains within, its ecosystem, while Google’s extends to pervasive cross-platform tracking and profiling. > if Apple launches a "private personalized ad platform", the fanboys will be singing its praise This is indeed likely, since as an example, Apple spends extra time and energy to prevent even themselves from getting data, such as how they break up your Apple Maps trips directions requests into anonymized segments, to avoid letting themselves capture users' full trips. Apple deliberately makes their own data use more difficult, and in some cases makes certain uses impossible for themselves, to serve users' privacy. When you look at Alphabet or Meta engineering, you see their schemes serve to give them the ad profile data, while making it inaccessible to competitors. TL;DR: For both ad platforms and privacy engineering, as the Gus Fring meme goes, these "are not the same".

jollyllama 2y ago

What's baffling to me is how this is acceptable to enterprise customers. Your "free PC" was acceptable to you as a poor student, but would never have been acceptable to them. Now, most of this bloatware remains on millions of work PCs.

itsyaboi 2y ago
ltsc
jjnoakes 2y ago
Any enterprise install I've ever used has the annoying stuff removed. Small businesses are most likely the ones suffering though.
- ActionHank 2y ago
  This is exactly it. They know that their home users have likely used and learned about Windows through work. These users see it as the only professional, best in market option.
- jollyllama 2y ago
  I guess it depends on the quality of your IT department. I've seen large companies that are handing out laptops with the candy crush, etc. News in the search bar. Lots of distractions.
CydeWeys 2y ago
Enterprise customers aren't dealing with this BS. They get good Windows, not available to the rest of us :(
- munk-a 2y ago
  Even enterprise windows versions don't have a side-dockable taskbar. Microsoft really seems to be begging to be out-competed lately.
  - 2y ago

DEADMINCE 2y ago

> I’ve had to remove it all twice but with every significant update, somehow my settings get reversed and we’re back at square one. You're not removing it properly. After I setup my first install of W10 nothing has ever been changed or reverted after any update.

DEADMINCE 2y ago
Downvoted, but the fact remains. If your settings revert after every update, you didn't tame W10 properly. So those people downvoting likely have some reading to do, or they can downvote and keep feeling hurt and keep fixing their installs every couple of months.