Windows 11 Start menu ads are now rolling out to everyone
Microsoft is starting to enable ads inside the Start menu on Windows 11 for all users. After testing these briefly with Windows Insiders earlier this month, Microsoft has started to distribute update KB5036980 to Windows 11 users this week, which includes “recommendations” for apps from the Microsoft Store in the Start menu.
Luckily you can disable these ads, or “recommendations” as Microsoft calls them. If you’ve installed the latest KB5036980 update then head into Settings > Personalization > Start and turn off the toggle for “Show recommendations for tips, app promotions, and more.” While KB5036980 is optional right now, Microsoft will push this to all Windows 11 machines in the coming weeks.
Microsoft’s move to enable ads in the Windows 11 Start menu follows similar promotional spots in the Windows 10 lock screen and Start menu. Microsoft also started testing ads inside the File Explorer of Windows 11 last year before disabling the experiment and saying the test was “not intended to be published externally.” Hopefully that experiment remains very much an experiment.
If I see your company or app advertised on windows 11, you can be sure I will be actively avoiding said company/ App. Even if I need the services advertised, I will be looking for an alternative just because.
I have the same policy for pop up ads.
I’m not sure these ads are even paid for by the developers of the apps that show up. It looks like this is an ad for the Microsoft Store in general, as Microsoft gets a percentage of any sales.
They also may be included if you pay for your app to be on the homepage of the Microsoft store
Yeah if your app has in app purchases or requires payment it probably can show up here. Probably in the contract you sign to put your app in the Microsoft store
Don't disagree with the sentiment but I didn't think companies had this much leeway in how their ads were displayed.
They can pick which type of ads they buy which this certainly will be its own premium category
No candy crush for this guy!
Or 1Password, apparently
How did the default attitude toward the user get so hostile? The amount of toggles you need to set just to have a smooth experience with minimal tracking is insane. The people in here defending it by the fact it can be disabled are missing the point: we shouldn't have to deal with it in the first place.
You shouldn't. I haven't. Microsoft is a plague and a choice.
You're not wrong, but there's a larger issue here: the fact that there's an alternative does not make what Microsoft is doing okay. This shit ought to be prohibited by consumer protection law.
Yeah it’s not just Microsoft. Fucking ads in my doorbell app, Google TV, etc.
Putting ads in a product you paid for should be illegal.
TBH I am fully expecting a world where, in the next 10-15 years, some company will make a car that plays unskippable audio ads every X number of miles/km which can be disabled for $9.99/month.
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Before you can place this emergency call, here's a word from our sponsors at Nord VPN.
The choice is hard to make when Microsoft's garbage has been shoved down your throat for decades, it's the default pretty much everywhere and the only viable alternative, for 99% of the population, is Apple.
Governments have been way too lenient and passive towards Microsoft for far too long
This is largely because Windows and MacOS come preinstalled and that's how the vast majority of people interact with operating systems. If you had to choose your OS, I'm sure there'd be more choice in the market. Not necessarily Linux, but just more choice in general.
That's pretty much my point, 99% of computers sold are sold with Windows on it and the leftover percent is 99% Apple and maybe 1% Linux.
And that's mostly because no one did anything when Microsoft licensed their crap to big OEM.
If any given computer sold was Linux (or any other free OS to be fair) by default and Windows as a paid option, it would change the market massively I believe. It would take time obviously but I'm convinced it would work in the long run.
You don't choose your childhood education. Microsoft and Apple offer schools deals to create adults dependent on it - after all they'll be using it in work too.
This is a direct result of our Wall Street economy. Wall Street demands that each corporation's stock price shall increase every quarter. No matter what. If that means the customer is unhappy or that a corporation must consume itself from within. Doesn't matter.
Pretty simple. Stock go brrrr.
Fewer people are buying PCs now that Smartphones have replaced the need to have one for most uses, but Microsoft still has to make more money every quarter than the quarter before because the stock market doesn't value stable profits.
It got here because it’s super profitable, and that’s all the C-suite cares about, and they’re the ones calling the shots at the end of the day.
I also think that engineering ethics has, in general, been strongly de-emphasized, and true holistic ownership of technical products is now usually held by business and finance types instead of engineers, with all the negative consequences that that entails.
Edit: also, don’t forget the Peter principle
Having control over other people's computing gives you power over them: you can gain from their detriment. It's not like everyone is uncaring or greedy but even people with good intentions do not have infinite willpower to resist temptation. When the user doesn't like a change from an update their choice is usually to put up with it. Defending ads in a menu or opt-outs that should be opt-ins in hidden menus is less mental work than learning what an operating system is and that you can use a different one.
By sharing the source code instead you give up that power - if you fail to be good to the users then other devs can work on it without you.
Didn't I pay for the OS?
You pay for the privilege of getting ads beamed directly to your desktop
Sure, we've had first payment..
"We've had one payment, yes. What about second payment?"
I paid for 10.
Which is why I never enabled TPM on my motherboard. I didn't pay for 11. I do not want 11.
I paid for 7 and upgraded it to 10. I may go to 12 later on (Windows alternates between solid and awful, so 12 may be fine) but it's also quite likely I'll wind up moving to a Linux distro as my primary and keeping Win10 as a fallback. No way in hell am I touching 11.
Did anyone pay for 11?
Microsoft has been giving it free left and right.
Everyone paid for a windows os, but they've been forcing upgrades for what I assume are completely unrelated reasons
I did. I was naive and had just built a gaming pc. 10 was no longer for sale
No you are just renting to see more ads.
I didn't pay for the OS.
I think it's safe to say that over 99% of custom built pc doesn't run on proper windows license
Where did you come up with that figure? I have two PCs and they have two separate licenses. One is custom built and the other was prebuilt.
Pretty much everyone I know has a pirated copy unless it's in an enterprise setting or pre-installed with the hardware.
Been the case since Windows 98, might be longer too.
Why would anyone pirate Windows and risk malware? You can download it for free straight from Microsoft, and you can just skip the product key step during installation, it works without a key just fine.
I came up with that figure knowing that there are much more 3rd world country people who can't afford proper PC let alone windows license.
Honestly, considering China/India, I think my figure has to go higher than not.
So you guessed? You don't have any kind of way of confirming that figure? I see 37% from some studies. Microsoft itself has monetary estimates but no percentages of stolen software.
Even if that's true, custome pcs are a tiny fraction of client computing, oem desktops and especially laptops completely own client computing, most people only ever get a laptop
You know, I get if they want to do this to Home editions, but why in the world would they do this to all editions? At the very least, this should never apply to domain-joined computers.
Money
Seems short sighted to annoy the people who pay you the most money already.
What are they going to switch to?
Most orgs will just put up with it because of inertia: existing software that has to work, employee's having to learn new skills, "sysadmins" who only know Microsoft, etc.
HEY
Nothing personal, lol, but I stand by my quotes.
I feel like sysadmins need to be comfortable in multiple environments. I also work with some really crappy ones who only know how to reboot a faulty system or crawl to Microsoft for support. No reviewing logs, no digging in at all, just "welp, a reboot didn't fix it. Gonna submit a support ticket and make no further effort".
There's a lot to be said for a good generalist, but at some point, specialization takes you farther. I ended up with Windows server and Active Directory, as well as Exchange (lots of other stuff, too, but those are the main things). Apart from mass workstation management, or when a help desk person asks for a hand, I haven't dealt with non-servers in a loooong time.
My last few experiences with Microsoft support (spread over many years) have been "If I can't figure it out, Microsoft probably can't, either." For a smaller company, with a limited IT staff, having someone who is able to efficiently interface with vendor support without necessarily having all the answers themselves can be a useful thing. But I totally get what you're saying.
Profits now are all that matter. The future is a problem for after dividends and bonuses get paid out.
But they could be paying the most money even more.
how soon do you think ms gets hit with a lawsuit because a malicious ad infected BlackRock or Deloitte or some shit
If there's anything that I've learned, it's that lawsuits are more often than not, just a joke to the large companies.
Hell it's often easier for them to just classify whatever fine they get slapped on the wrist with as a business expense, than to do the right thing, it seems.
I installed Linux Mint a few days ago. It's been great so far.
Windows 11 made my girlfriend's laptop so slow, even she asked me to install Linux, and she is not even a techy type.
Nature is healing!
I installed Mint for my elderly mom a couple years ago, because Windows 7 was EOL and even 10 would've been too slow (had an experience with an involuntary upgrade on our family laptop years earlier).
I installed pop os and libre office on my wife's laptop not long after Pop was released, and by now I don't think she would know what to do on Windows or Mac. So proud of her.
I wanna like Linux but I play too many games with anti-cheats that just don't work on Linux yet :(
I mean, you’re not wrong. Anticheat is pretty much the one thing that Linux doesn’t play nicely with. Given, it’s largely on the game producers to fix, not on the OS. But it’s still a valid complaint from an end user perspective.
If Linux fans truly want to encourage migration, stifling valid complaints isn’t the way to do it. The issue with everyone going “oh it’s so easy, it’s so much better, you won’t regret it at all” is that as soon as a user encounters a hangup they’ll be more inclined to just abandon it altogether. Because if everyone is going “oh it’s so easy” but you’re not having an easy time with it, then you’ll quickly conclude that maybe it’s just not the right fit for you. And the people going “lul just don’t play those games then dummy” need to get some friends. Because when all of those friends are playing the shiny new game but they’re locked out of it due to their choice of OS, they may consider dual-booting Windows just to be able to keep up with their friends.
But this is Lemmy and the Linux fanboys can’t tolerate a single toe out of line. So I guess it makes sense why you got downvoted.
It's the other way around.
Anticheat doesn't play well with Linux.
Did you stop reading right there to comment? Because I say exactly that in the very next sentence. I agree with you. It’s just odd that you’d quote that one specific sentence with a “well akshually” when I literally addressed that exact thing one sentence down.
you say its on the game devs to fix, but game devs don't usually roll their own anticheat. And when they do it would then be their problem, i suppose it could be them having had a bad decision i suppose?
I will say the solution to that IS to not play those games, but that only starts to work when enough people do that to hurt the bottom line of the devs
it's technically a valid complaint, it's not a linux problem though. Don't come crying to us when your game doesn't work, we've literally made 90% of all games ever work under linux with zero effort for the end user.
It'd be like buying a proprietary macbook for instance, and then when you find out that the only people who want to service it, are the people who sold you it at an aggressive price, who will then still, ask you for even more money. Only to complain about right to repair not letting you repair your device, even though it's an apple issue.
What do you want us to say? We can't physically test every game to ever exist, and premeditate every issue to ever have possibly occurred to someone. Part of linux is literally learning how to solve these problems, that's why linux is such a great system OS, when you have problems, you can often just fix them yourself.
I mean sure maybe linux is too hard for you, how hard did you try to understand it? Maybe it's not the right fit for you, but then i would expect people to just not care about linux. Rather than call it shit, because they didn't understand it.
Also, dualbooting is a valid option, a lot of linux users even have a dedicated windows machine somewhere in their house just because of how shitty everything is these days. Nobody is saying you can't do that.
Honestly the best solution is to find alternatives
If the audience stays on Windows then there is no incentive to support Linux
Its not that easy. There is no alternative for some of the big games. I play genshin impact and honkai star rail and these games do not run on linux.
I use linux but keep windows dual booted purely for these games.
Asking people to give up their hobby is not a solution.
A solution doesn’t mean everyone will use it
Even if no one uses it that is still what has to happen for devs to target Linux instead of Windows
Imagine every Genshin player moved to Linux. Would the game move to Linux or just die?
I hear you, it sucks sometimes, especially with Asian-made games/software which LOVE locking themselves to one OS or platform literally for completely random, arbitrary reasons. You can still play them on mobile though. Especially given that you don't quite want to install a Linux OS on your phone yet (I mean traditional Linux, not Android or a de-Googled Android offshoot) since that's still largely a work in progress and not ready for primetime yet.
genshin works now btw
As far as I know, pretty much the only anti-cheat that doesn't work on linux is the kernel-level malware kind. I personally avoid those games at all costs regardless. That's easy for me to say though, since I barely play any competitive games...
Easy solution, stop playing those game /s
shrug.
its what I did. Its not that hard a sacrifice.
really only asian mmos that had the obnoxious no-worky-linux anticheat to begin with, in my experience with what i played.
i mean, most of those games just aren't very good games. Drugs are pretty cool, alcohol is pretty fun, people actively avoid that shit though.
It's up to the person whether they value playing a single game more than experiencing a wholly different and more respecting operating system i suppose.
Technically they do work, but the publisher is blocking Linux.
The launchers work. The games do not. But plenty of games are going that way.
Hopefully those games go to steam deck as that seems like a way to have a market share they might then cater for (I can't play BF on Linux due to the antichear requirements)
check https://areweanticheatyet.com to see if they work, they might
Welcome to the good life, with the exception of VR and (rootkit) anticheat for multiplayer, it's all smiles over here.
Hope Mint treats you as well as it's treated me! (Even though most of my tinkering breaks stuff, reinstall incoming I suspect)
I don't play anything multi-player so it's not an issue. And I have to little time to play single player games I can simply ignore stuff that's not compatible.
As far as VR, I am holding out hope that valve will make a Quest like VR headset.
What do you like and don't like about it so far? What system did you install it on?
I’m getting extremely close to making a tiny partition for windows (so I can play gamepass) and then using a Linux distro for my day to day. Are there still issues with Nvidia drivers on Linux? Its been a long time since I’ve run Linux.
PopOS handles nvidia drivers perfectly.
I recently installed Nobara with Nvidia on my three year old alienware desktop because of Windows 11 turning to advertising shit. Nobara is finicky enough that I might jump over to PopOS. Lots of shearing and frame skips in video, let alone in gaming. I don't have this issue on my other laptop with PopOS on it.
Sounds like you're not using the proprietary binary blob.
I've used both Linux Mint and Manjaro, and my Nvidia card has done fine in both. I switched to Mint from Windows because it was easier and faster to set up under Mint (Windows was missing a bunch of drivers and the OEM's site didn't have updated ones). The only configuration I had to do was select the proprietary driver (and Mint has a nice little GUI for that). If you're on the fence, I highly recommend trying Mint.
Seconded. Mint is the best distro for anyone who wants to get started with Linux with the least amount of hassle. Installation is a breeze and it just works.
Thirded. I set Mint as the default boot, then have a copy of windows available as an alternative OS option when required.
I installed Mint last night as a dual-boot and had a few issues, the boot loader would not load into Windows Boot Manager and when I manually selected Windows Boot Manager in UEFI Windows booted but hard locked until it reindexed the drive I partitioned for Linux.
The Mint OS works fine, to be clear. My issue with the dual boot is mostly getting Windows to play nice.
I have not tried it, but I’ve heard good things about bazzite as a good steam deck clone that has a strong community committed to Nvidia support.
Worth looking into at least!
No way Jose. If anything their approach is inspired by Fedora Atomic, which is the cornerstone of Bazzite.
Other than that, yes, a very very solid approach for daily usage for casual gamers.
Oh it’s my time to shine! I just installed bazzite onto my ROG Ally yesterday.
It is pretty fantastic so far. Not perfect but very good.
Also, it doubles as a pretty OK developer machine because it comes with buildutils, unlike the steam deck. I was able to get my Nix dotfiles set up on it and do a little Rust work to try it out.
Bazzite is a neat concept, and I run it too. Still haven't gotten VR to work properly, though (Quest 2)
I made it through two whole top level comments before getting to a switch to Linux comment.
It was my turn this week!
So you're saying we should do better?
I've had the rare issue with my 4070ti that probably wouldn't have been a problem with AMD, but most things run great. Using endeavorOS
Not really. With the super easy, friendly distros it basically just goes.
I switched to Linux Mint Cinnamon a while ago expecting to just fool around a bit but mostly boot back into windows to do stuff. I've now found that the ONLY thing I need to go back to windows for is when I'm forced by dumb policies to use an MSOffice product, which fortunately doesn't happen to often (and no, LibreOffice is absolutely not a sub for MS Office. The spreadsheet app is worse than google docs, and I'd rather work in typst than have to deal with the libreoffice writer -- especially as soon as I need to display an equation/figure/table of contents. Of course, I'd rather work in typst than deal with MSWord too...)
That said, I don't really play games anymore. Games may still require frequent windows visits. But... I've been looking forward to a complete edition of horizon forbidden west and all accounts say it's linux compatibility is near perfect, so maybe things aren't so bad these days on the gaming front.
Well I changed my nvidia settings from on demand to a lower value and rebooted Mint a few weeks ago. Then there was no display at all and several hours/days of searching led me to reinstall Linux again and I did not have good backups. There was probably an answer there, but my frustration with Linux is real!!! I still refuse to use anything else and flop between manjaro and mint. I think having proper system backups and a live USB ready to go is helpful...I'm much more defensive running Linux because I keep getting shitty surprises, but I still feel better about it over using windows.
I did the same for the few game I can't run. Nobara installed working drivers in 1 click. My GPU runs a bit more than it should on the desktop but the last driver update made a big difference.
Im planning on switching the Window install back to 10 since 11 is too shit.
But a tiny partition will not do for Windows.
I switched to Pop OS a year ago and the Nvidia drivers are fine. There are definitely some things that are a pain in the ass. My fingerprint scanner won't work even though it is in the list of ones that work in fprintd and I don't feel like going through the process of submitting a ticket and troubleshoot it. Getting some games to run properly in WINE can also be a pain. Overall though, I'm fine with it.
Win11: less functionality, more ads
And what's with the weasel words like "recommended"? Just call them "sponsored" or "ads", like they really are.
Are they sponsored? I was under the impression they were usually just Microsoft advertising their own shitty stuff? Ads, sure. But for it to be sponsored, someone else has to pay for them
The screenshot shows 1password, which to my knowledge is not affiliated to Microsoft, so I think yes, they are sponsored
Windows 11 (and how much I like my experience with the Steam deck, if I'm being honest) has me seriously reconsidering switching to Linux for my gaming desktop
I've only been playing games on Linux for the past year and it's been a pretty smooth experience. Go for it!
How hard is it to make a decent OS Microsoft? Haven't you got enough of our money already?
Honestly they peaked at windows XP.
I haven't needed a upgrade and every time for the past 15 years, it's been forced on me.
XP was great, but Windows 7 was the peak.
its been all down hill from 7.
Yup. I feel like people saying XP was the peak is mostly nostalgia.
You could make barely any UX changes to Win7 and people would still happily use it today. I don't think the same is quite true for XP.
To be fair, though, I also have nostalgia for XP. I've played a silly amount of Space Cadet Pinball on my steam deck lol
I wouldnt say I have nostalgia for XP itself, but I do look on it fondly, the same reason I look on 98 fondly.
It was better than its previous OS. More stable, more usable, requiring less reformats to keep it snappy and healthy, etc.
Which is one of the many reasons why 7 is the peak. Cause you didnt have to regularly reformat 7. It was just that good at managing itself, and its snappiness, that you never had to reformat/refresh the install cause it never got bogged down.
edit You can download and run space cadet pinball on linux, I think i got mine off Discover (which probably is the same thing as every other distros app store/house/whatever)
Win7 was somewhat better IMO, at least at one point.
I consider Windows 7 to be Windows XP 2.
I consider XP to be Windows NT 5.1 and Win 7 to be Windows NT 6.1 :)
And we don't speak of NT 6.0
That's what I was going to add... After Win7 the dissatisfaction mounted enough for me to try Linux... Then I kicked myself for not switching sooner
Nah, I preferred Windows 2000. It was basically XP, but without the stupid taskbar design. I also liked 98 SE or whatever it was called, and 3.1 was pretty okay as well at the time.
The shareholders must be appeased.
When your business model revolves around indefinitely maintaining backwards compatibility with every weird bug and quirk your enterprise customers baked into their workflows back in 1983 while also trying to be on the cutting-edge and constantly overhauling your products, it's hard to develop and maintain a modern operating system that isn't a completely horrible shitshow.
Maybe they should branch Windows like in the old times of 9x and NT.
Keep a backwards compatible version for companies and create a new clean OS from scratch like Apple did with OS X.
Yeah, they do the compatibility mode thing for older apps, but it seems like a lot of work to maintain separate shims for each older version that still have compatibility problems when you could just refactor everything with a reasonable amount of legacy support, and push all the users of really old software to start using VM instances of their old OS's. Surely these enormous financial institutions running bespoke financial apps using a custom COBOL interpreter that only works correctly in Windows 95, have the wherewithal to load up a VM.
Oh look another reason why I’ll be switching to Linux next time I have to upgrade my pc. Fml I’m going to have to learn what a package manager is ew
Two minutes later
"Wait, you mean I get fast, convenient package delivery without being advertised to?"
The package manager was actually one of the simpler things about switching to Linux in my experience
Here i was thinking we were talking about men's underwear
;) package managed
damn, i wasn't ready. i got fucked up
Package managers was one of things that I had hard time adjusting to when I first adopted Linux, since I was so used to just searching for software on the internet, downloading, and installing it when I was using Windows. Now that I'm comfortable with a package manager, I find the Windows experience of installing software to be so much worse. It's so much nicer to just install software using one or two commands in the terminal.
it's often really hard to get around that "culture" barrier of just not downloading EXEs. Once you figure that out, it's so much easier.
This was my experience precisely. These days, installing some .msi or .exe.from some obscure corner of the internet seems somewhat ass backwards.
Out of all of things in Linux a package manager most of the time is there to save your sanity.
I feel angry when I have to hunt down the installer for an application under Windows, and then know I have to go find it again later to update it. I have no clue how I got by without a package manager on Windows. Though if they had one, you have to know it would be complete intrusive dogshit about 5 minutes into its existence.
You can use the official WinGet package manager for Windows pretty easily.
you can also just use linux. Every flavor of linux except for nix (kind of) and LFS have a package manager
As a former Windows user, Chocolatey is a great way to get used to a package manager through Windows. I used it to install stuff like hwinfo or wiztree.
Chocolatey's saving grace is that it's third party. IDK how well it's maintained and expanded, it's been some time since I used it and there wasn't much on it when I did.
They have a database of packages on their site. This page also popped up with info on how packages are moderated and stuff too.
I've been using some Linux flavor for about 15 years. The biggest thing about switching (at least back then) was I knew how to configure Windows just to my liking. With Linux it was a lot more difficult because I had to google everything. Like "how do I change the wallpaper?" How do I get the login screen to appear on the correct monitor, etc. It was just frustrating because I knew how to do this in Windows, but I felt like a major noob again with Linux.
15 years ago, you had to google everything, but people starting today will find it much easier with any of the modern GUIs.
Plus consider the whole systemd fiasco. Old timers find it difficult to adjust to such a different paradigm and lose so much knowledge, but someone new to Linux doesn’t have any previous knowledge in the way, and may find it more similar to their Windows experience
Yup same here. But I've compiled my own kernel already....copy pasting instructions. I've chrooted to a failed X computer from a USB Linux to then fix X and go back to a good computer. I mean there are levels of engagement and it just takes time to learn. But certainly android users are using a Linux-like system themselves not knowing anything about the levels below where all the action is. You can make Linux as dumb as windows 3.0...well maybe not as dumb. And you can make it as configurable as you want. I mean, you could even rewrite all modules and recompile them such that if a virus is hitting all other Ubuntus or mints, your system would be fine because it was different by a single letter or something as such.
use NixOS to get absolutely fucked.
I use NixOS btw
(don't actually use NixOS as your first distro. It is really amazing and cool, but the learning curve will be so steep, it will kill you)
Dont forget dependencies
I didn’t know about them in order to forget :,(
package managers are your heaven, and a windows users hell.
They're great.
Windows sucks. I wish I could put Linux on my work computer.
I brought an acer leptop a couple of years back and acer made it nearly impossible to install any other os then windows onto it
Because of Intel RST? I just had to deal with that but was able to get a dual boot of mint on my acer.
edit For those who come across this who has the same issue as I did. Video: https://youtu.be/sGJL62ZYRTU?t=77 Text: Boot to your BIOS. Get to the MAIN tab and hit CTRL+S to show hidden bios option. Disable Intel RST. Exit and Save. Re attempt to install Mint.
Let me preface that with I'm a bloody linux and every releated noob and it's been like 5 years so my memory is a little fuzzy: I never figured out why Ubuntu didn't run but it just didn't, after i got mint working i realized that there are no drivers and a leptop with out touchpad/wifi isn't why I needed it in the first place..
It was an aspite 3 a315-41g. I quickly googled to refresh my memory and I read something about that, I can't recall if I tried it out though. I needed to changed a few settings so maybe I tried.
Ah, I have the aspire a315-56. Mint was pretty painless for me after the RST issue. I didn't have to worry about wifi/bluetooth/touchpad drivers at all. Right out of the box its been smooth (for linux) for me.
How long until Mom gets malware from them?
This is what i fear. How much curation and monitoring will be done on the ads, or this will be another vector for malicious application
How long until we get to the default "I don't get paid to ask questions" mentality of ad services.
I assumed it was "just" for apps in the Microsoft store. So they shouldn't get viruses, but that doesn't mean they aren't getting software that is garbage.
Note:
"All you have to do is set some flags in GPO policy editor and relogin the first time and every time there's an update. Easy"
The post literally tells you that the option to turn it off is in the settings menu at: Settings > Personalization > Start Menu > “Show recommendations for tips, app promotions, and more "
It's not good, but it's way better than you are making it out to be.
At least until Microsoft decides to hide it deeper, like they do with all of their most useful options. Nothing like navigating fifteen layers deep into your settings just to change something basic.
Hopefully WinToys will have an update with this option, so it won’t matter where Microsoft decides to move it this week.
yeah and they also made an online account, optional.
Good thing it's still optional.
dude istg i see windows users coping harder than linux users.
It's kind of sad.
And the wind screams Linux
If only Linux wasn't so frustrating to use for the average enduser. I'd never recommend it as a daily driver for 95% of people.
I'd argue that for the vast majority of users, a stable, modern Linux distro will meet their needs perfectly. Web browsing, watching YouTube, checking e-mail, looking at pictures of cats on the internet...
It's special/professional use-cases that are still lackluster. Try doing professional level photo editing on Linux... It's a nightmare. Integrating with corporate cloud solutions? Nah. Are these things doable? Absolutely. By the majority of users in that specific use-case? No.
But day-to-day, general use PC stuff? Yeah, absolutely. Even gaming is more accessible than ever. There's exactly one game in my Steam library that doesn't just work... To be clear, it doesn't work at all, but that's just because of my hardware setup. (Halo Infinite + Intel ARC + Linux = Game can't even launch. Worked fine with an AMD card, but when I upgraded late last year it borked. Known problem with Vulkan, DX12, and ARC)
I can be on a tirade about this. If only Krita decided to expand their focus instead of being conservative about their goals, or if GIMP actually had competent people years ago. But, now I'm at a point where I just don't give a damn about FOSS editing, and fine with let it all burn.
Lol! I'm fine with GIMP, actually. As a matter of fact, I prefer it to Photoshop. That's likely due to GIMP being my first introduction to photo manipulation though, and so I'm used to its paradigm.
Photo EDITING, though? There's no competition on Linux for the likes of Lightroom or Capture One Pro (my preferred RAW editing software). I gave up photography for a while because I hated editing my photos on Linux so much. I tried EVERY alternative Linux had to offer, and they all suck. Eventually, I started carrying around a USB-C SD card reader and just transferring photos of my camera to my phone to edit them in Snapseed of all things, I hated editing on Linux so much.
My try with GIMP is that I find that the interface is clunky, and the absence of non-destructive editing, and it's nowhere near the level of Krita/PS at a mechanical level. I tried the version with NDE in GIMP, but I just hate the flow and I find the absence of ease of access to filter as well as lack of inherent mask a issue. So, I'll stick with Krita instead, and it works out for my needs, but I'm not fully satisfied unless I have better selection tools in there.
Yea, that was my take as well. Try RawTherapee, they said. Nope, inferior, there were some photos where I could spot them in full-screen view, not even at 100%.
The one everyone always drones on and on about is Darktable... Don't get me wrong, it's a powerful piece of software. But... It's lackluster compared to the competition. I used it for a long time, figuring if I just made myself keep using it I'd get used to it... And then I actually stopped and thought about that sentence, lol. I shouldn't have to Stockholm's myself into liking a piece of software.
Oh yea, I tried that too, nope, just simply can't compare. That's why Adobe still gets my money as much as I don't want to give it to them. Luckily the Photography plan hasn't increased in price... yet.
It really doesn't. My girlfriend needed to enable the Japanese keyboard on Kubuntu. That required half an hour of searching documentation and forum posts about how to install/enable FCITX5, then another hour debugging to find out it doesn't work on apps installed via snap.
I still haven't been able to come up with a KDE based distro (because it's way more familiar to Windows users) that actually meets the needs of non technical users.
Don't use snaps.
People shouldn't be using Ubuntu either but I suppose that's not going to happen. Just use a derivative like Linux Mint
This is, again, an atypical use-case. Despite that, it's not hard to find the answers. Googling for "Linux Japanese keyboard layout" comes up with an easy-to-follow guide in the first 5 search results, literally on the Ubuntu forums. Understand I'm not saying the use case is particularly RARE, but it's not the norm either. And honestly, Snap sucks anyway. 😂
It could certainly be better supported and better documented, but you're looking through the lens of your specific experience, not realizing your experience is not that of the every day, average PC user.
Put up a dart board of the most widely used KDE distributions and throw a dart. You've got a KDE distro that actually meets the needs of a non-technical user. Kubuntu, Linux Mint's KDE edition, Fedora, OpenSUSE, hell throw Manjaro with KDE on. The desktop environment has zero bearing on a distro's ability to act like a computer, it's only the paint on the walls. If a distro "fits the needs of a non-technical user" by your definition with, say, GNOME or Cinnamon or XFCE or Budgie or whatever else, it'll do it with KDE too. Desktop environment != distribution.
Windows is frustrating for average people, the thing is that they get used to ms bullshit because they think there are no other way.
Understanding Linux kernel is medium hard, but not frustrating. Using a DE is NOT frustrating if you understand what's up with their core ideals. D-Bus, HOOKS, env variables... meh I can give you that. But 95% of users live in the web and/or office apps. And for that literally any flavor of Linux will do. My in laws would never in their lifetimes be able to distinguish Arch + KDE + SDDM + themes from Windows. I can bet my right testicle.
Linux isn't frustrating at all. Not sure what you're on about.
Everyone? This shit will be on my work computer???????
I'm not sure tbh, but this should be deactivateable by gpos. Work machines should not be affected if the IT staff is on to it.
I hope they are and the world will be forced to either make a law against it or goodbye windows because fu.
Imagine having to pay employees to watch ads that make microsoft money, what a fucking joke that would be.
Just like other enshittification, they don’t care if you turn off the ads because they have a captive audience in your grandmother. Think of all the non-techies who will just accept this. Or not even conceive of a way to turn it off. The question is how many will this push to give up Windows? So far it’s proven extremely “sticky”, they have freedom to abuse their customers, who have to come back for more.
So it’s at least somewhat of a losing proposition for Microsoft as well, if people follow through. There are more choices available everyday, but it means learning something new.
I do need to revisit Window’s myself. I consume media on iOS, work on OSX and Linux, do home projects on Linux, so a lot of my time is other platforms. However my laptop is still Windows, for one remaining game plus tax prep software. I should try these again
When they rolled out the beta Microsoft said it wouldn't be, but they could always change their mind with the general release. Excerpt from a previous Verge article about the beta rollout (https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/12/24128640/microsoft-windows-11-start-menu-ads-app-recommendations):
Unfortunately, this article doesn't actually quote Microsoft saying it's rolling out to ALL machines. That bit in the article is from the author.
Yet another bullet dodged since my move to Linux, thank fuck. Fuck you cunts at Micro$hit.
So angry
Wouldn't be if they weren't constantly trying to load hardware I own with unwanted ads, software and unnecessary shit nobody asked for.
I like Linux, but I just use too many apps and programs that are only available for Windows. It's a no-go for me and, I suspect, many others.
Think I will try Linux for real now
Yeah I've been thinking that too. Not sure I have time to learn it though so I keep sticking with windows. But I really have to make the effort to switch.
I'd suggest a cheap used or spare laptop/desktop with a beginner friendly distro like Linux Mint Cinnamon to learn on. Just use it for casual stuff -- you'll pick up what you need to learn as you go.
That way if something breaks or you don't know how to do something while you're learning you're not "stuck".
I will just dual boot at the beginning and play around with Linux for a bit.
I just switched to Manjaro with KDE Plasma. The most complicated thing to set up was forcing steam to run games with the nvidia drivers, which took 5 minutes of adding a start parameter to my games.
From a consumer perspective i even find many things easier than in Windows. It works out of the box. The package manager provides every tool you need, and if you want to change a setting, it is as easy as typing the name of the setting into the start menu.
Seriously, if you do not want to dive deep, you can do everything without more complication than under windows, often even easier.
Two big things to do before you decide that.
Do you run nvidia graphics? cause they are a PITA and influence your distro choice (you'll want a distro that has nvidia drivers baked in.)
If you game, go to https://www.protondb.com/ and check out a handful of the games you play. 99% of games work on linux with steams Proton (lets windows games run on steam), the only ones that dont are ones with invasive anti-cheat, so use protondb to see if any of your important games have issues.
and as a final note of encouragement.. I made the swap years ago, it was daunting..and there were a couple issues, but overall, far more easy than I ever expected it to be. (for me, cause I built the PC with the switch to linux in mind, so all my hardware is AMD). I am not a sysadmin or anyone who had any significant experience linux before my swtich, and I switched cold turkey after a brief weekend of basic researching. In other words, I'm a moe-ran. So if I can do it, pretty much anyone can. Good luck with it if you do try to make the switch :D
Try Mint, it's nice :)
Come to the dark side. We have
cookiesno adsLinux is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be.... unnatural.
That's disgusting.
Fucking unhinged idiocracy. Capitalism is the cancer of humanity
For those who want to stay on windows and avoid this trash:
https://github.com/Open-Shell/Open-Shell-Menu
An open source start menu replacement. Been using it for 6 months seamlessly and it’s great
MS: "were just gonna break that next update...thaaaeeunnnks."
cant wait until 6 months when this breaks completely.
Why does the OS have to recommend you apps?
In case you accidentally misplaced your brain in the trash, for example.
Just in case you didn't have enough apps installed from the factory.
"Tips and recommendations".
For years I had that turned on in Windoof 10 as it sounded like: "we see you're regularly doing X or having problem Y. Here is a way how to make X simpler and a solution for Y."
Instead it was nothing like that. It was literally nothing at all. Probably they just tried to shove some ads down my throat, which I luckily didn't see.
But it has become clear enough: it's not about helping users with useful tips and recommendations. It's about luring them into buying some stuff.
They can find new clever euphemisms, like EA did with their "surprise mechanics". But it is what it is: ads, digital noise, a waste of resources and probably one of the last incentives I needed to fully switch to a good Linux distro.
I used Windoof just for gaming anyway. And as I'm already working professionally with Linux, it will hardly be a miss.
Corporate America has gone from providing value to extracting it...
Good thing I switched to Linux 10 years ago. No regrets.
Sudoer for about 18 now. Full on Year of the Linux Desktop for about 5 years now.
The
spiceshit must flowThey can at least be disabled but it's always something with MS these days.
I'm just here waiting for my wife to finally snap and ask about getting Linux on her gaming PC. I've been using it for 20 years now. The complaints are becoming more and more numerous these days, it's only a matter of time.
I'm calling it now.
Windows 11 will be the new Windows 8. Or NT. Or millennium.
NT? You mean Vista maybe? NT was a massive product line that was pretty popular, and the kernel touches most releases to this day.
Yeah... NT was hugely successful and it's been the core of every Microsoft OS for over 20 years.
There were no ads on Windows 8, NT, or ME
Realistically, how many years do you think Microsoft will support Windows 10? I dread having to switch to 11 some day, at the rate they're going.
This is my line for biting the bullet and switching to Linux. I hope gaming gets to where I want it to be (braindead easy for anyone with 'actually' on their lips)
I'm thinking the same regarding Linux, but I dunno shit about it and while I'm not totally computer illiterate, switching operating systems like that is very intimidating to me.
Gaming is pretty close now thanks to the Steam Deck and Valve’s work on Proton. It depends on what games you play since some anticheat requires Windows or console but I mostly play single player games and have a console if I want to play something competitive.
If you have a specific, competitive game you play, you might want to stick with Windows (or console) if support isn’t there. AMD GPUs are also better for Linux (because they open source their drivers) but Nvidia is getting better since a lot of machine learning customers use Linux. They have a huge financial incentive now that it’s data center customers complaining instead of random Linux users.
Windows 10 eol is Oct. 14, 2025. 18 more months.
Omg, this isn't long enough
I turn this off anyway, as in Windows 10 it always kept pushing 3rd party apps. Is this ad any different to the Windows 10 "Suggested App" that was in the start menu for it?
Lol. Another reason to be glad I don’t use Windows as my main OS.
Is it surprising, though? When earning more money is involved?
This is the best summary I could come up with:
After testing these briefly with Windows Insiders earlier this month, Microsoft has started to distribute update KB5036980 to Windows 11 users this week, which includes “recommendations” for apps from the Microsoft Store in the Start menu.
“The Recommended section of the Start menu will show some Microsoft Store apps,” says Microsoft in the update notes of its latest public Windows 11 release.
Microsoft only started testing these ads two weeks ago, so it’s surprising to see this “feature” progress from the Beta Channel to release in such a short period of time.
At the time of initial testing I mentioned Microsoft “could decide to ditch these ads” if there was enough feedback that suggested they weren’t popular, but two weeks of feedback certainly isn’t long enough to determine that.
If you’ve installed the latest KB5036980 update then head into Settings > Personalization > Start and turn off the toggle for “Show recommendations for tips, app promotions, and more.” While KB5036980 is optional right now, Microsoft will push this to all Windows 11 machines in the coming weeks.
Microsoft’s move to enable ads in the Windows 11 Start menu follows similar promotional spots in the Windows 10 lock screen and Start menu.
The original article contains 303 words, the summary contains 200 words. Saved 34%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
2 weeks is most certainly enough time to read the listen in on the thousands of thousands of people saying fuck off Microsoft, stop with the fucking ads.
Nobody outside of those getting profit thinks this is a good idea...literally no one.
Is there a way to GPO this 'feature' off? Worried about some of our users getting confused.
Of course, all those things just have a toggle.
They get paid to implement the ads, not to enforce them.
And even if they hadn't there would be a third party program somewhere that turns them off.
Possibly, but these will change on the regular
Me, on my Ubuntu machine: 🧐🤔😂😂😂😂😂😂
yeah you get ads in the terminal instead
Wait, what? Ubuntu spams you in the terminal?
Your comment is hilarious because Ubuntu placed ads for Amazon in the equivalent of start menu way before Microsoft even had that idea. Ubuntu now displays ads for Ubuntu Pro (or Premium, whatever the name is) in the terminal. Ubuntu is the Windows wannabe of the Linux world.
The direction Windows 11 is taking is terrible but i've tried on multiple occasions (even this morning!) to game and consume my content on Ubuntu or Fedora and i run into so much trouble, that ill have to stick with Windows 11. I have been using Ubuntu at work for the last 10 years though as web development is great on it.
Issues i have:
Lutris not finding GoG games
Heroic working, but not being able to sync savegames for GoG
Having installed GoG with Bottles and then the game itself works, but my framerate wasn't that great
Nvidia driver getting borked after kernel update, need to switch to old kernel, uninstall, switch to new kernel, reinstall
Mangohud flatpak not working together with Goverlay repo version
Need alternative for Synology cloud sync. Maybe Syncthing or rsync with SMB
And i need alternatives for fps limiting, undervolting and cpu undervolting. Haven't put enough time into it yet though
I like the mouse acceleration on Windows and in KDE both flat and adaptive feel pretty flat. Probably can be tweaked with xinput or something, but you can't configure the acceleration amount by default
Maybe one day, but for now Windows is probably just the better choice for me and gaming (on a laptop). At least in Windows 11 they now allow you to not group the taskbar by default..
If you're not ready to switch, most of the issues and anti consumer shit with Windows can be managed through a combination of Group Policy, Registry, various settings and configurations menus, and a wee bit of PowerShell.
I used to post comments like this on Reddit. I’m an expert in PowerShell, group policy, and Windows enterprise management in general. Point being I know how to do all that stuff. Over 99% of Windows users do not. But I completely decrapified my Win10 install and was mostly happy with it.
When it was time to go to Win11 I realized all this effort is just Stockholm Syndrome. I shouldn’t have to protect myself from the maker of my OS. And it’s clearly getting worse so why put in the continual effort?
Moved to Tumbleweed a month ago on my main home PC. Microsoft is just my day job again, and I feel so much relief not having to be on guard for whatever shady shit they pull next.
Edit: to be clear I’m not critical of your post. It’s nice to educate those that want to protect themselves. I’ve just come to realize there’s a better way for me.
I'm still ok with windows 10 and by the time it's no longer supported, proton should be mature enough for me to make the jump with no regrets.
Have fun with em kids
Note that you can turn the ads off quickly and easily. I agree that there's someone off-putting about an operating system with built-in ads, but a tech-savvy person will see them once and then never again. (A person who isn't tech-savvy probably won't care.)
My money is on them being re-enabled after every update.
Ah, the ol' "Please use Edge" update screen that pops up every few months.
This setting exists on 10 and I've never had it re-enable itself.
I'll still be using Windows (no time for Linux), but really, why does the user have to do this for a pleasant experience? MS shouldn't be hostile towards their users.
I really, really wish Linux worked better on my gaming laptop. I used it for many years on desktop as my only OS (hopped many distros and ended back on mint) but on laptops I just can't find a distro without considerable issues. Whether it be display scaling problems, performance, not being able to switch my video card mode, etc...
nvidia card im guessing? Switching using nvidia is almost never fun. Theoretically i think proprietary drivers should maybe support this, but i've never tried.
Scaling problems are usually related to having multiple monitors, so i'm confused that you were having those, unless you were using multiple monitors, then it would make sense.
Linux has huge problems on my laptop, cause HP in their infinite wisdom decided to disable S3 sleep at firmware level. I still find myself dreading the thought of reinstalling windows though. I'd rather manually shut off my laptop every time I stop using it than go back to that awful proprietary OS.
I just got a Framework laptop, and it’s really refreshing to have everything (literally everything) just work out of the box.
I finally activated windows last week through the cmd... Didn't pay a cent
I am just waiting for a malware developer or state actor to use this as a way to infect computers with 0-days.
This is a disaster. Why anybody would decide to use Windows for any serious workloads is unfathomable to me.
Office products are mostly cross-platform (outlook, word, excel).
If I could get easy to access, judgement free tech support for Linux then I'd be fine (outside of walled gardens like Discord). I just don't know how to solve my problems in Linux especially considering there are so many additional variables and often you either don't get answers, are asking in the wrong place, or are asking in the wrong way. A lot of the time you just get scorn for not being born a Linux power user.
I do feel like I have basically no choice but to switch once W10 runs its course. I've got a dual boot of Fedora 40 KDE that I'm toying with.
Do Win 10 LTSC users still get shoveled this shit? I'm asking for a friend.
Linux.
Finally! Seemed unfair that only a select few were getting these initially.
Anyone remember when OS updates were actually something we looked forward to?
I got my first notification on my Win10 Pro box today about support ending too
I just can't stand the lack of hibernation or hybrid suspend on laptops with Linux. Otherwise I'd much rather have a Linux distro on my nice laptop and windows in a VM if at all.
Both of those work on Linux. https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Power_management/Suspend_and_hibernate
We need to hunt down whoever these ads are working on.
Good thing Ubuntu 24.04 LTS comes out tomorrow. I’ll be doing a reinstall on my machine and sticking with it until the next LTS release in two years.
Easy peasy fix for that :
Use AdBlock filter that run on root of OS/Host like hblock, hagezi, or 1Host
I installed PopOS this week. Let's see if my experiment works better than this experiment from Microsoft.
Hopefully somebody will figure out how to murder the "feature."
I'm on 10 still. (And if I wasn't a gamer and sucker for games that don't work on Linux - I would be on Arch)
Proton works wonderfully these days.
Let me see if I can use windows without opening the start menu now
Since I've adopted PowerToys -> PowerToys Run and set a shortcut to open it with "Super (windows key) + Space" I don't know what a start menu is.
And they called Google scroogle😆