Let’s put it this way; when Microsoft announced its plans to start adding features to Windows 10 once again, despite the operating system’s inevitable demise in October 2025, everyone expected slightly different things to see ported over from Windows 11. Sadly, the latest addition to Windows 10 is one of the most annoying changes coming from Windows 11’s Start menu.
Earlier this year, Microsoft introduced a so-called “Account Manager” for Windows 11 that appears on the screen when you click your profile picture on the Start menu. Instead of just showing you buttons for logging out, locking your device or switching profiles, it displays Microsoft 365 ads. All the actually useful buttons are now hidden behind a three-dot submenu (apparently, my 43-inch display does not have enough space to accommodate them). Now, the “Account Manager” is coming to Windows 10 users.
The change was spotted in the latest Windows 10 preview builds from the Beta and Release Preview Channels. It works in the same way as Windows 11, and it is disabled by default for now because the submenu with sign-out and lock buttons does not work.
Microsoft believes if they worsen the enshitification of Windows 10, more people will just upgrade to 11 quicker.
I decided to move to Linux and my other family went with Macbooks.
Sadly, I’m at a Microsoft office and do not have this option for my work machine.
It does look like I’ll be forced into Linux on my personal machine before too long, though.
Not much to be done with a work machine, but for personal use, I believe the more people moving away from Windows the better.
Sam Reich? Did you get a haircut?
Seriously, I’m just munching popcorn with all these MS headlines lately, contentedly using my machine that does everything I want and 0 things more, all without actually having to fight with it for that outcome.
IS THE ENTIRE FUCKING ECONOMY BASED ON ADS??? WHO THE FUCK IS PAYING FOR ALL THESE SHITTY ADS??? WHO EVER YOU ARE, GET FUCKED WITH YOUR PRODUCT!
Who even buys shit because of ads?
Yes, literally anyone that wants to sell a product or provide a service relies, to a large degree, on advertising.
It’s been this way for over a century.
The fact that people pay hundreds of dollars for this OS to get advertised to is insulting. Same energy as these smart TVs that feel like they have the right to show you ads.
If I’m dictator, I’m making this shit illegal, full stop.
ShutUp10 for the win.
(Linux for the real win).
Shutup10 for sure.
Linux, nah. It still can’t do what we need it to do, so it’s not the proper tool for the job.
Chicken and egg. Linux is roughly 4% of the OS space. If more people would get on board, it would become a better tool. I use both. Windows because I have to. Linux because I want to.
Linux missed the mark years ago. It’s not a lack of people using it, it’s a lack of usability for people. You’re blaming users because Linux doesn’t work for them.
My standard response to “just go Linux” :
I keep having to say this, as much as I like Linux for certain things, as a desktop it’s still no competition to Windows, even with this awful shit going on.
As some background - I wrote my first Fortran program on a Sperry Rand Univac (punched cards) in about 1985. Cobol was immediately after Fortran (wish I’d stuck with Cobol).
I had my first UNIX class in about 1990.
I run a Mint laptop (for the hell of it, and I do mean hell) . Update: stopped running Mint on that laptop, it’ll never be viable for the intended use-case. Power management is a joke. Configured as best as possible, walked in the other day and it was dead - as in battery at zero, won’t even boot.
Windows would never do this, no, Windows can never do this. It is incapable of running a battery to zero, it’ll shutoff before then to protect the battery. To really kill it you have to boot to BIOS and let it sit, Windows simply will not let a battery get to zero.
There’s no way even possible via the Mint GUI to config power management for things like low/critical battery conditions /actions. None, nada, zip, not at all. Command line only, in the twenty-first century, something Windows has had since I don’t recall, 95 I think (I was carrying a laptop then, and I believe it had hibernate, sorry, it’s been what, almost thirty years now).
There are many reasons why Linux doesn’t compete with Windows on the desktop - this is just one glaring one.
Now let’s look at Office. Open an Excel spreadsheet with tables in any app other than excel. Tables are something that’s just a given in excel, takes 10 seconds to setup, and you get automatic sorting and filtering, with near-zero effort. The devs of open office refuse to support tables, saying “you should manage data in a proper database app”. While I don’t disagree with the sentiment, no, I’m not setting up a DB in an open-source competitor to Access. That’s just too much effort for simple sorting and filtering tasks, and isn’t realistically shareable with other people. I do this several times a day in excel.
Now there’s that print monitor that’s on by default, and can only be shut up by using a command line. Wtf? Again, in the 21st century?
Networking… Yea, samba works, but how do you clear creds you used one time to connect to a share, even though you didn’t say “save creds”? Oh, yea, command line again or go download an app to clear them for for you. In the 21st century?
Oh, you have a wireless Logitech mouse? Linux won’t even recognize it. You have to search for a solution and go find a third-party download that makes it work. My brand new wireless mouse works on any version of Windows since Win2k (at the least) and would probably work on Win95.
Someone else said it better than me:
Every time I’ve installed Linux as my main OS (many, many times since I was younger), it gets to an eventual point where every single thing I want to do requires googling around to figure out problems. While it’s gotten much better, I always ended up reinstalling Windows or using my work Mac. Like one day I turn it on and the monitor doesn’t look right. So I installed twenty things, run some arbitrary collection of commands, and it works… only it doesn’t save my preferences.
So then I need to dig into .bashrc or .bash_profile (is bashrc even running? Hey let me investigate that first for 45 minutes) and get the command to run automatically… but that doesn’t work, so now I can’t boot… so I have to research (on my phone now, since the machine deathscreens me once the OS tries to load) how to fix that… then I am writing config lines for my specific monitor so it can access the native resolution… wait, does the config delimit by spaces, or by tabs?? anyway, it’s been four hours, it’s 3:00am and I’m like Bryan Cranston in that clip from Malcolm in the Middle where he has a car engine up in the air all because he tried to change a lightbulb.
And then I get a new monitor, and it happens all damn over again. Oh shit, I got a new mouse too, and the drivers aren’t supported - great! I finally made it to Friday night and now that I have 12 minutes away from my insane 16 month old, I can’t wait to search for some drivers so I can get the cursor acceleration disabled. Or enabled. Or configured? What was I even trying to do again? What led me to this?
I just can’t do it anymore. People who understand it more than I will downvote and call me an idiot, but you can all kiss my ass because I refuse to do the computing equivalent of building a radio out of coconuts on a deserted island of ancient Linux forum posts because I want to have Spotify open on startup EVERY time and not just one time. I have tried to get into Linux as a main dev environment since 1997 and I’ve loved/liked/loathed it, in that order, every single time.
I respect the shit out of the many people who are far, far smarter than me who a) built this stuff, and 2) spend their free time making Windows/Mac stuff work on a Linux environment, but the part of me who liked to experiment with Linux has been shot and killed and left to rot in a ditch along the interstate.
Now I love Linux for my services: Proxmox, UnRAID, TrueNAS, containers for Syncthing, PiHole, Owncloud/NextCloud, CasaOS/Yuno, etc, etc. I even run a few Windows VM’s on Linux (Proxmox) because that’s better than running Linux VM’s on a Windows server.
Linux is brilliant for this stuff. Just not brilliant for a desktop, let alone in a business environment.
Linux doesn’t even use a common shell (which is a good thing in it’s own way), and that’s a massive barrier for users.
If it were 40 years ago, maybe Linux would’ve had a chance to beat MS, even then it would’ve required settling on a single GUI (which is arguably half of why Windows became a standard, the other half being a common API), a common build (so the same tools/utilities are always available), and a commitment to put usability for the inexperienced user first.
These are what MS did in the 1980’s to make Windows attractive to the 3 groups who contend with desktops: developers, business management, end users.
All this without considering the systems management requirements of even an SMB with perhaps a dozen users (let alone an enterprise with tens of thousands).
Thoroughly enjoyed this post thanks. I have long wished for a FOSS OS that can truly become popular by considering these users and carving a mainstream path for them. Even - for people who don’t even know what terminal/shell is and don’t care.
You post this same thing all the fucking time. “Someone said it better than me,” this guy decides to install random shit and run whatever command he can find and it, shockingly, doesn’t fix the problem?
You must be fun at parties
I was going to write a reply to that guy about how linux doesn’t work for the common man, but then you come in and write shakespear level articulation that blows away my tiny brain cell reply.
It’s just such a complete analysis of the situation. The only thing missing is how linux requires you to use the terminal. Yes, REQUIRES. People can say it doesn’t all they want, but go on any self help guide, and any problem you have, is “step 1, open terminal”.
What would you say to someone who doesn’t know what terminal is?
“Ok, open terminal?”
“Whats that?”
“Its like a command line, but better”
“Whats a command line?”
And this is why 96% of people AREN’T using linux. Most windows users don’t understand how windows works. Most drivers don’t understand how cars work. And linux you HAVE TO be a mechanic to use linux. Because unlike windows and mac, linux isn’t designed to be used by idiots. And most of the world are idiots. Hell, I’m an idiot.
And until linux can fix itself FOR the user, no user will even take a look. Even if there were a single distro that did all that, you’d have to convince people “this linux isn’t like the other linux”. It’s the main reason that even though Android is linux, it stays far far away from that branding. It doesn’t want the linux stink.
And from what I’ve seen, every developer WANTS linux to be hard to use. Like a right of passage. “I had to endure these learning curves, and so shall you!”
deleted by creator
If they can’t bring the people to Win 11, they bring Win 11 to the people instead?
Just install Linux, it’s not that hard. Or at least get a Mac or a Chromebook…
I have been installing Linux on a number of my work PCs that I manage. Most of them are pretty straightforward, office products, printing, web, basic video player. But my personal PCs have so many different programs installed for different niche uses that it’s been a massive roadblock to me switching over. I know it’s coming because I’m not moving to Windows 11 even though my PC is compatible in theory. But man is it going to take me a lot of time to figure out all of the different screen capture, video editing, audio extraction and editing, disc imaging, photo editing etc. I know I can figure it out, but it’s about the time. I have a huge steam library too,but most of that should work.
Any of you playing Fallout London on Linux?
screen capture
OBS (same as is popular on Windows).
video editing, audio extraction and editing
I basically never do that sort of thing, but if I needed to I’d start out with Kdenlive and Audacity, respectively.
See also:
https://itsfoss.com/best-video-editing-software-linux/
https://itsfoss.com/best-audio-editors-linux/
disc imaging
For a task that basic, most of the time I just use
dd.photo editing
GIMP and/or Krita.
I wouldn’t suggest GIMP to anybody: Photopea. It is very similar to Photoshop and is a webapp.
Was in the same place, got FOSS soft for almost everything so now I run Mint on my main PC and on my laptop too, with a little 100€ used think centre running photoshop (I’m starting to figure out krita/gimp but pixel editing is a bummer there IMO) and 3dsmax for when I need them.
Edit: no internet connection for that box ofc.
Just install Linux, it’s not that hard.
This is just but the small first step. I was basically checking what it will take to daily drive linux on my desktop, and there’s many little roadblocks that I’m just instead considering getting a Win 11 pro license next year and just turning off all the shit in gpedit.
- No RGB software for my gigabyte mobo (openrgb doesn’t have it).
- No AMD adrenalin unless I go with Ubuntu, which is just on the same path of enshittification as windows
- No steelseries engine
- No Sapphire trixx
- No microsoft office desktop/onedrive (means I gotta find an office replacement that also works on my apple devices and syncs)
Linux has come a long way, and it’s probably enough for some but it would be a massive headache for me still…
Yea, it’s definitely not for everyone yet. But the average user (who needs a browser, a file manager and maybe an office suite) has no reason to stay on windows besides the convenience of being installed already.
You can mount and sync your OneDrive files with rclone, which I think is much nicer than OneDrive, but maybe not easy to set up if you’re not comfortable with command line interfaces.
You know that you dont have to pay for a Windows license right? You can permanently activate it (and any version of office) with a script. I found some article a while ago talking about it, some official Microsoft tech support used it because they were frustrated with Windows, so it’s legit
I do computer repair/tech support for just a small business. I haven’t used Windows on a a personal machine in a looong time, but that script helps me when I get stuck at work
Windows 10 will be my last Windows operating system. It’s been fine and it works well enough. I’ve already started setting up a drive with Linux Mint 22 for use moving forward.
Well, I was gonna run win10 until its service life ends next year. I guess MS want to speed up the timeline a little.
Arch here I come.
Join the free side. We have penguins.
Already run it on my laptop, and used to dual boot. I’m just trying let proton mature as much as possible before migrating my desktop for good.
I just recently installed the windows 11 LTSC IOT enterprise edition, it contains no ads and is meant for corporate use. I got it off of the massgravel Dev site. The only thing pre-installed is the edge browser. Boots way faster and my games are right there. I have it dual-boot alongside Ubuntu. I recommend it if you have to use windows for some programs.
This is what I’m planning to go to once my IT department figures out how to implement windows 11 across our systems. We tried a controlled roll. Out and has to roll back to windows 10 because some of the software we use (mandatory) doesn’t work quite right on 11 (menu problems and weird crashes from what I saw -but it’s legacy software from the windows XP times so that’s to be expected, even in compatibility mode). They’re still going to try because the alternative is to pay for the extended support and the company doesn’t want to. I guess we’ll see what happens.
Dang I thought Windows 10 would be safe from this for some reason. Silly me.
no security updates, only ads
Windows 10 already had ads, I don’t see why MS would be adverse to adding more.
They’re doing a good job getting people to move to Linux or MacOS
I’m in the EU and use Windows 10 LTSC so I mostly clear off of this bulshit. A few months ago I bought a cheap refurbished laptop to use occasionally and decided from day 1 it would be Linux Mint only since I only use it for the basics.
A few months later and I’m surprised how far Mint came. It’s so easy to use. Customizing it was a bit harder but nothing major. And to my surprise…even games. I threw a couple of games at it and everything the computer can handle would run. I was from the time where gaming on Linux was a no-no.
When LTSC support goes, I’ll most likely go full Linux. The only problem is the Adobe software but maybe I can fix that with a virtual machine.
…decided from day 1 it would be Linux Mint only since I only use it for the basics
What kind of out of the ordinary things cannot be done with it?
I switched from Windows 3.11 and I’m still puzzled by this.
I always love when people pretend to be mystified that someone has trouble running programs on Linux when I, a non Linux user, see plenty of examples of people having trouble getting programs to run on Linux scrolling through “Everything” on Lemmy
Well, some people want to run programs on Linux that were written for other operating systems.
As it happens, it can be done, but it’s not the simplest way to do things.
It’s like buying a PlayStation and complaining it won’t run Super Mario properly.
What if those are the basics?
If those are your basics, have you considered running a Nintendo system?
I tried but Nintendo issued a DMCA takedown
The way your comment reads, you’ve been using Windows 3.11 these past decades. 😂
Cannot be done with Mint? I’ve OS hopped every few years - currently running Windows 11 at work and Mint at home. I much prefer the Mint install. That said, I’m a video producer - and video production just isn’t there yet on Linux. CUDA’s a pain to get working, proprietary codecs add steps, Davinci’s linux support is more limited than it seems, KDenLive works in a pinch but lacks features, Adobe and Linux are like oil and water, there’s no equivalent for After Effects… I don’t doubt that there are workarounds for many of these issues. But the ROI’s not there yet. I’d love to see a video production focused distro that really aimed for full production suite functionality. Especially since Hackintoshes are about to get even harder to build.
I guess that’s a valid edge case. Although I thought that some professional editing suites had been ported (not Adobe’s, obviously). Apparently it’s not the case.
I have to use a windows 11 machine for work, and it genuinely surprises me how terrible it is. I don’t understand the opposition to local accounts - if I’m working somewhere with public WiFi/capture portal, I have to use my phone as a hotspot first.
The PIN log in seems to roll a random number and decide each morning whether it is going to work or not.
I also got a laptop with 11 on it for gaming. So much spyware I’ve had to uninstall, configuring anything is a nightmare. I was trying to adjust my mouse sensitivity/figure out why the scroll wheel is either 0 or to the moon, but even when you dig into the control panel, half the settings are missing.
I also had to turn off my WiFi and google commands to make a local account, because otherwise Microsoft accounts are mandatory.
Every change seems to make the experience actively worse for the user.
See and my friends give me shit for running KDE, soon they’ll have to click past a Viagra ad to do so.
Everybody should learn about pihole.
Or pfBlockerng
Pfblocking?
https://www.patreon.com/pfBlockerNG is a addon for pfsense which is a router os for X86/64 machines. If you don’t want to block porn it will run on nearly anything. You can block all dns over tls or https. Many of the list you need can be selected in the gui.
