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Microsoft wants to move Windows fully to the cloud (www.theverge.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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If this happens, will it be a mass exodus to Linux/Mac? Or will people just live with it? The fact that the Steam Deck has shown great promise in playing games on Linux has made me reconsider Windows yet again.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Microsoft isn't going to be replacing desktop Windows installations with cloud installations, and nowhere in the article does it suggest it is.

I'd say Microsoft's long term needle-moving strategy including the bullet point "Move Windows 11 increasingly to the cloud" suggests it pretty strongly. Calling it "needle-moving" says to me that they want the cloud to be more and more the expected default, rather than an option that exists alongside desktop installs.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Perhaps I've just read too many Microsoft business documents (I used to work for them years ago), but that's not how I interpret that slide. It looks more to me like they want to "cloud-ify" functionality that could be used either from a desktop install or from a cloud streamed version. The key phrase in that slide to me is "Use the power of the cloud and client to enable improved AI-powered services and full roaming of people's digital experience".

That kind of fits with what they've been doing by moving Windows login to use a Microsoft Account by default (which I hate, btw -- I'm one of those local account people), as well as integration of OneDrive as default file save location. It's the same kind of thing Apple's been doing with macOS for the past few years, adding iCloud integration with everything. If you move that functionality for desktop installs to mostly be cloud-based, it also allows you to create a more viable cloud-only offering. But it doesn't mean there's a reason to stop selling a desktop-installable version.

Microsoft is still a business, and they'd lose a ton of market-share by killing off desktop installs, especially in the enterprise sector, which is their bread and butter. They're looking to expand into other markets, not kill off large existing ones.