• ares35
    link
    fedilink
    911 months ago

    at some point we’ll be renting windows, not buying it. so there will be a “last windows you’ll ever buy”. if microsoft had their way, we’d be at that point now (they’ve run trials on subscription-based windows way back in the early win7 days). but us lowly users are probably ‘safe’ until whatever’s after 12.

    • @Perfide@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      411 months ago

      I would agree if not for the fact they keep making it easier to get windows for free. I haven’t bought windows in over a decade, activation is easy af, the days of sketchy malware riddled keygens are long gone.

      The truth is worse, imo. They don’t need individual consumers to pay for the OS, OEM licenses are where they make bank anyways. At the consumer level, you’re never gonna sell enough copies, even on a subscription model, to profit more than you would be from giving it away for free, getting everyone using it, and then simply selling their data until the end of time.

      • @captainlezbian@lemmy.world
        cake
        link
        fedilink
        111 months ago

        And it helps enhance their other products. Your home computer has always come with windows. So your employer buys it for everyone because everyone understands it. Maybe they have you use Mac if you’re an artist or dev. But since you’re on windows you’ll use office, and it might cost you a bit, but they’re more concerned with your employer buying it for you. Hell you probably have office at work even if you’re on mac. And from there each and every new thing they add is part of their ecosystem with all the trust of “it’s from Microsoft, it’ll work”

        It’s easier and more corporate trustworthy to just buy Microsoft and the only thing that can challenge that is if enough people not only don’t use it at home, but actively are worse with it than something else.

        • @msage@programming.dev
          link
          fedilink
          011 months ago

          FTFY:

          It’s from Microsoft, it’s gonna be much worse than any alternative, it will crash like the economy every time in a critical moment, and your employer won’t let you use anything else.