this post was submitted on 18 Sep 2023
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God forbid they make money on a product they have given away
Given away? Windows is a paid product. And there are other (free!) operating systems that are not driven by profit.
I've never paid for it. Most Windows 11 users have not paid for it. You can buy a license but they also gave it away to effectively everyone and anyone who wants to can run it without buying it so long as you don't mind the "activate more" watermark and less appearance options
...having a demo version of windows does not count as "having it".
It's a paid product. Windows Home costs 139$. And if you bought a laptop or pre-built PC with windows on it, you have already paid for the license as part of the price. And since most people buy pre-built PCs, or laptops, most people thus do pay for the windows license.
So people having the ability to use it and cover week their needs without having to pay money to Microsoft for Windows 11 then that means Microsoft needs to recoup those costs somehow. I know you want to move those goal post but the reality is still what it is.
I feel like you didn't read my reply
In addition, the paid versions still track you
They gather some kind of data, they aren't tracking a specific person
you're either naive or you're working for microsoft.
Good one
most users (outside of a few countries) have paid for windows. via oem or volume channels, as that's where the vast majority of users source their windows from. oem pc sales or volume licenses. whether the original was 7, 8, 10 or 11. at the end of the day, a legit activated license for windows 11 is, or was born from, a paid license.
More than likely they didn't buy a Windows 11 license. It's far more likely they bought a Windows 10, 8 or whatever the hell license from previous versions. Only a small percentage will have bought 11
They make their real money on Azure iirc. And they've recently had a security leak of about 38 TB of data. Nice.