Maybe for now, but as soon as more people switch to Windows 11 or Microsoft apps that constantly show you ads and are basically spam / adware themselves, Linux will get more appealing.
Microsoft is unfortunately learning from social media companies. Not only do you PAY for the product, you are also the product, and get your personal info stolen and get served ads even while you pay.
It’s getting to the point where I’m seriously eyeballing Mint again, or Kubuntu. And I’m the kind of person that’s generally too lazy to even dual boot anymore.
Sorry for the uncalled advice, but you might want to avoid Ubuntu. Canonical (the company behind Ubuntu) is being rather obnoxious pushing for a technology called “snaps” that has a bunch of issues, among them performance.
Mint is fine. In fact I’m distro-hopping from Ubuntu to Mint again.
I kind of like Windows 11, but even the Pro version is riddled with ads. The search banner in the taskbar has them regularly, there’s a large number of falsely installed Microsoft Store apps in the Start menu (which get downloaded when you click them, like Netflix, Disney+, Spotify, Instagram, I think also TikTok and I’m certainly forgetting some), the whole “news” menu on the left side of the screen is just that too. The Windows 10 default Mail app (which I think is close to be the perfect email app on Windows) is also being retired in favor of Outlook, the free version of which has an ad displayed either as a banner at the bottom of your mails list, or as an unread email at the top of it. This prompted me to enjoy the Thunderbird update, which isn’t as good but has no ads. And that’s not even counting Edge, the shortcut of which gets added back to the desktop on a regular basis, which redirects all HTML help pages and searches to itself instead of using the default browser.
You might not have seen any ads on your W11 computer, but it’s probably either because you have a system-wide adblocker, installed scripts to remove some of the most invasive bloat, or simply hand pick and manage carefully all apps and and settings on your systems (that’s what I do, but when I do I make it so I won’t see it again). Or you don’t notice them as ads, which is sadly very possible.
It’s probably just that I take five minutes to clean up the mess after install and it’s not an issue ever again…
Just do it. I used Windows mainly out of apathy for years. But once I made the switch, I never looked back. Mint is easy to use and doesn’t get in the way. And there’s zero shitfuckery going on.
Might sound stupid, but I want to be apathetic about my OS. I mainly game and I have been using Windows since I was 8. I know it in and out and if I am not forced to (or if ads really get that crazy), I am not gonna switch. It’s just nothing I am remotely passionate about.
Linux seriously needs to figure out laptop battery life. Not much chance of going mainstream when installing it means a 50% drop in your battery life. Until then, I’ll use Linux on my desktop and just disable all the adware spam shit in Windows on my laptop.
Exactly! This sentiment is why I ditched Windows in the first place. That and the combination of unnecessary annoyances that slow my workflow in which the majority of Windows users seem to be desensitized too.
Linux already works for my use case, so why would I want to voluntarily deal Microsoft’s anti-consumer practices? I don’t.
