Comment by wewewedxfgdf
6 days ago
Microsoft could have made Windows:
able to run on any hardware
free for basic usage, paid for commercial usage
lightweight, simple, stripped of all cruft and extras
consistent in it's UI and cleaned up from 40 years of inconsistencies
But they didn't - so people are looking for alternatives.
As much as I like many Windows versions, the corporate idiocy of the company behind the OS is indeed something else.
Never ascribe to stupidity, that which has been proven to be malice.
Yeah, they delivered whatever they delivered on purpose. Sometimes I imagine MS is playingn Lemmings with their users to reach their corporate goals.
I doubt the various shitty parts of Windows (not the forced AI/whatever) is due to malice, unless you mean employees maliciously trying to destroy the company.
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Hanlon's Inverted Anticapitalist Razor says to never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by greed.
This
Minimum 50% of cases (in anything). Probably higher
I get the impression that a lot of the old guard are long gone from the Windows team or have no influence. Raymond Chen is still around but not sure how much he actually works on Windows day to day.
Microsoft was founded in 1975. 1981 was the first DOS release. 1985 was the first release of Windows. 40 years working on windows is a long time, I would be surprised if anyone for the original team is left at this point. Even someone joining out of college in 2000 is now 25 years in, is 57, and could feasibly be retiring....
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which brings the points about demographic, experience and wisdom.. the artefact we see and manipulate is the results of a certain group of people... when it changes, don't expect anything
The toxic culture from Gates will never go away
With the way the economy is going (some call it K-shaped) it's more profitable to squeeze as hard as you can and extract as much as possible out of whales versus trying to have mass market appeal. Azure, Office and Copilot will sustain them.
Nvidia is doing something similar where they're just extracting as much as possible out of AI companies and not caring one bit about consumers.
Consumers need to remember how to wield a pitchfork
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>With the way the economy is going (some call it K-shaped) it's more profitable to squeeze as hard as you can and extract as much as possible out of whales versus trying to have mass market appeal
How does whatever microsoft is doing to windows line up with that?
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This is true with a lot of companies. If you made people actually use their own product (do they?!) maybe they'd think twice before doing boneheaded things
Then again, I get the biological desire to put food on the table for one's family and therein lies the problem
If you made people actually use their own product (do they?!)
Yes, they do. Unfortunately even MS employees are powerless to do anything about the crap that gets shoved into Windows by other employees working at the company, and the ones who complain about it are quietly shown the door or have already left of their own will, leaving only those who are completely apathetic or...
Then again, I get the biological desire to put food on the table for one's family and therein lies the problem
Exactly. That and the desire to remain in the country --- part of the reason why companies like H-1Bs so much is because they are going to be far more docile and less willing to resist doing things they feel are wrong.
I remember I was at a Python conference some years ago and every Microsoft dev I saw had a MacBook. So no, I don’t think they use their own product internally.
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"I get the biological desire to put food on the table for one's family and therein lies the problem"
They don't make money (put bread on the table) by selling Windows any more. That is soooo 2000s.
Income is from data mining and from subscriptions to cloudy offerings that are mostly MVP (Minimum Viable Product).
Oh, and hyping their perceived value to the point that the term "meme stock" is no longer just a joke.
When did any manager get promoted for keeping software stable?
Just look at google and their chat softwares... you either make something new, or someone else does and you're left behind... be it ads in their start menu, spyware "AI", or paid solitaire.
When did any manager get promoted for keeping software stable?
A few industries reward that. Telcos and other parts of critical infrastructure come to mind.
I worked for a telco for four years. It was horrifically stupid and rewarded the dumbest possible outcomes.
Is goal is increase revenue! Create project to roll out fibre to a new rural community. Sign up all 40 houses in that community at $100 a month.
Project cost $10 mil.
Bonuses and promotions for increased revenue!
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The employees inside really wanted to build this. The company decided not to.
I'm not so sure about that. If Microsoft actually removed all the cruft, then they would need around 5% of the employees currently working on it. They'd all be unemployed.
You’d be surprised how many legitimately want to improve the product. This idea that we’re powerless to disobey our incentives is so reductive.
They basically did that though for basic usage. Not activating windows only stops you from changing the background and removes the watermark for activation.
It’s also illegal in most countries
So is exceeding the speed limit...
>free for basic usage, paid for commercial usage
And lose all the OEM license money?
Windows is now less than 10% of their revenue, last I saw. I think Windows is more valuable to keep people in the Microsoft ecosystem, than as a source of direct revenue.
Do they make more money from OEM licenses, or from bombarding Windows users with OneDrive and Copilot 365 advertisements?
What if it's actually the AI-derived "user profile," sold to advertisers/govts, after their mandatory bot scans all your drive.
Just hypothetically... of course they're not actually doing this?
----
Anywho, doesn't matter cause my Xeon went from Windows 10 to Linux, this year. Still rocking a Win7Pro Core2Duo (as my second favorite machine).
Perhaps Microsoft plans to bundle Windows into its "Microsoft 365" subscription for the consumer market.
won't someone think of the shareholders?
That's an OS for the users.
Windows is an OS for the people who use the users.
Microsoft's slogan in the 90s was "where do you want to go today?"
Now, it should be "where do we want you to go today?"
Thanks for the 90s nostalgia. I just realized how much I miss these days and their optimism.
Make it sound more empowering:
"Let Copilot decide where you want to go today!"
Honestly Windows 7 was the best OS they ever built. It just went downwards from there, and they abandoned it essentially.
I don't understand what's going on at Microsoft, but they leave huge stacks of money on the table. LTSC versions weren't "popular", they were the least worst option for a lot of industries. And now they kinda completely ignored all customer feedback.
Microsoft managed to make every other release of Windows good.
95 good, NT 4 bad, 98 good, 98 SE bad, 2000 good, Me bad, XP good, Vista bad, 7 good...
The plan with Windows 10 was to light their desktop market share on fire in the hopes they could see iPads in the distance and try to chase them. Windows 11 was codenamed "give your toxic ex a second chance."
I kind of remember 98SE being an improvement. Otherwise agree though
Nah, 98SE was a clear improvement over the base 98.
XP SP2 was pretty good too.
As was Windows NT & 2000 for their time.
Win2k is where it was at. It was also my last windows os ....
It’s not about giving you a clean experience, it’s about setting you up as a constant cash cow hooked into and paying for all their services.
I hate adobes current business model and for that matter fusion360 as well. It’s all internet required bullshit but it’s making them tons of money and there are no viable alternatives.
Luckily Linux exists.
I'll add, with no disrespect intended to BSD, because they're serious OSes, but GPL is also a really good thing to have
Yes, the GPL (by design) is what kept Linux from being embraced, extended and then extinguished
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It could be a nice OS, if Microsoft didn’t go out of their way to make it awful.
I run Active Directory at home, for various reasons. I’ve got Group Policy in a good enough shape now that I’m not terribly troubled by Microsoft’s enshittification but it took substantial effort to get there, and it requires some work to maintain.
> consistent in it's UI and cleaned up from 40 years of inconsistencies
... While also maintaining their famous backwards compatibility?
That would require empathy.
lol, what's your point really? alternatives exists since very long time.