Microslop Microslop Microslop. Microslop?
Microslop.
The only thing they’re rethinking is how to repackage this so people accept it. They learned a lot from this, but I promise you it wasn’t the right lesson.
It mostly looks like a mild slow down of user-facing release and rebrand of unpopular features.
It is not a retreat. The marketing team is just trying to figure out how to reframe things that caused public backlash.
Prolific cannibal promises to review their choice in seasonings to be more tactful as they continue to feast on PC users’ privacy, freedom and last scraps of digital dignity on a global scale.
I am sure that this empty promise of change has everything to do with their user empathy and absolutely nothing to do with their recent financial results which indicated how hollow their AI-slop-bullshit revenue growth was last quarter.
Bullshit and too late, bitches
don’t believe it. ms is in for the long game.
I’ve won when everybody gets the principles of free software philosophy, along with other essential freedoms, free roaming, free speech, free assembly, free press, free energy, free healthcare, etc.
It’s the freedom.
Free to use, study, share, change.
The Free Software Definition
The free software definition presents the criteria for whether a particular software program qualifies as free software. From time to time we revise this definition, to clarify it or to resolve questions about subtle issues. See the History section below for a list of changes that affect the definition of free software.
The four essential freedoms
A program is free software if the program’s users have the four essential freedoms: [1]
- The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0).
- The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
- The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help others (freedom 2).
- The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
A program is free software if it gives users adequately all of these freedoms. Otherwise, it is nonfree. While we can distinguish various nonfree distribution schemes in terms of how far they fall short of being free, we consider them all equally unethical.
In any given scenario, these freedoms must apply to whatever code we plan to make use of, or lead others to make use of. For instance, consider a program A which automatically launches a program B to handle some cases. If we plan to distribute A as it stands, that implies users will need B, so we need to judge whether both A and B are free. However, if we plan to modify A so that it doesn’t use B, only A needs to be free; B is not pertinent to that plan.
Three years late but thanks for giving me the push to switch
As usual with all of these companies: only believe when you see the changes
As usual with any company, fuck em! They only care about bleeding you of your wealth, not making the world a better place. They can eat shit and die.
Skill glad I switched to Linux gaming lol
I won when I ditched windows.
Yeah, it a temporary measure due to people leaving. Microsoft will not change. Linux is far better
I have one gaming PC and it’s on windows 10 till kike October or so of this year when security updates go away. Waiting to see if steam OS ifficially drops for PC so I don’t have to switch OS more than once. Already have it running on and processor and GPU for an easy Linux switch, and been running Linux on my laptop for a while now.
Watch your mouth, buddy!
Lol. All sorts of typos. I should proofread.
This has been a common sentiment, enough that I’ve thought of making a video about it.
Running a desktop OS, catering to everything people need from their PC, from printing to fringe drivers to VPNs to package management, is a big task. I have long doubted that Valve is personally interested in taking on that task. They write SteamOS for the deck and machine, since their only real responsibility is playing games. People who try to install that OS for other things will see some Flatpak friction - but that’s fine, it wasn’t built for that.
I’d strongly recommend looking at some other distributions with broader group support. My recommendation is CachyOS. Bazzite has worked great for others, but as a general desktop user I sort of bounced off of it - installing some unusual apps ended up getting a lot of friction against its emulation layers. I believe both are based off the same sort of origins as SteamOS, so that may be the safest thing.
I really do suggest using Bazzite if you don’t want to wait for steamOS.
I previously used Mint, haven’t had to install an nvidia graphics driver or new kernel since moving to Bazzite and I’m now learning distrobox so I can make my usual bad computing decisions in a safe space. Its a very stable base, and with container tech layered on, you can have all the fuck around you want with minimal find out.
Is it true? I’ve been lately looking out for a new atomic distro but I’ve heard it seems it’s not developer friendly with the sandboxing and extra efforts to get apt/rpm working. I am relatively new to Linux and stuck with Mint for now so I can’t add anything to it.
Depends what you want to do.
On distrobox, I installed a containerised version of Ubuntu that can interact with my host, sort of like WSL on windows. Anything I put in it remains isolated so I can’t install packages that break my system - and I can use apt to install whatever in want rather than rpm.
You could develop in a VM or container like distrobox, and tbh, the host can be whatever you need it to be. You dont actually have to move off Mint.
That being said, I dont see why you couldn’t just develop on Bazzite/atomic distros of your choice using flatpaks for IDEs. I believe it has c++ installed and you’d be able to layer whatever language you needed onto your atomic distro of choice.
If it has an AMD GPU you can just install it now, no waiting. But it’s not good at much more than just playing games, if you want a more general purpose machine I’d install something mainstream like Mint, Ubuntu or Fedora.
When I started using Linux in 2009 it had around 0.6 percent market share on desktop. Windows had 95%.
Today Windows is measured below 68%, and Linux has been measured above 4% by statcounter.com.
These things move faster the more people make the change. Linux only reached 1% in 2013, 2% in 2021, 3% in 2023, and 4% was somehow first measured already in 2024. For every single person making the switch it becomes easier for others to do the same, and companies consider Linux support to be a little bit more important. One can only wonder at which percentage of market share it will be offered as a mainstream alternative when buying a new computer, but it seems pretty clear that we’re getting there.
I guess my point is that we all won when you ditched Windows. Thanks for that.
It will be really interesting to see the figures at the end of 2026, when Windows 10 has truly reached end of life, and a whole bunch of people are going to be forced to choose.
10% market share is when I expect it to be impossible to ignore and I think we’re gonna get there fast like you alluded to.
But…mainly for games. The corporate crowd will stay on Windows because they benefit from propping up other corporations. PC/laptop manufacturers will still push Windows for the same reason
Total market share is irrelevant. What matters more is total users.
If you make a product and there’s a million people on a platform who could buy it, the costs to port that product (and support it) need to be low for it to be worthwhile.
If the total number of people on that platform increases to 10 million, now the cost to port/support becomes more like a minuscule expense rather than a difficult decision.
When you reach 100 million there’s no excuse. There’s a lot of money to be made!
For reference, the current estimated amount of desktop Linux users globally is somewhere between 60-80 million. In English-speaking countries, the total is around 19-20 million.
It’s actually a lot more complicated than this, but you get the general idea: There’s a threshold where any given software company (including games) is throwing money away by not supporting Linux.
Also keep in mind that even if Linux had 50% market share, globally, Tim Sweeney would still not allow Epic to support it. I bet he’d rather start selling their own consoles that run Windows instead!
For reference, the current estimated amount of desktop Linux users globally is somewhere between 60-80 million. In English-speaking countries, the total is around 19-20 million.
That sounds about right when comparing Microsoft’s claim of “1 billion” Windows devices. 5% of a billion is 50 million(not a perfect comparison as 5% Linux is total including MacOS/others from statcounter but you get the idea). So 50 million to 100 million Linux users globally sounds about right.
The corporate crowd will stay on Windows because they benefit from propping up other corporations.
I wouldn’t be so sure. An interesting indicator of the shift that many of you wouldn’t see is how many vendors of management and security software have put out Linux versions in the past 12 months. I’m talking about stuff like RMM (Remote Monitoring & Management), EDR / MDR (Endpoint Detection & Response / Managed Detection & Response) client side DNS filtering software, and other things.
This tooling is for managing and securing endpoints used by companies, either by internal IT or by MSPs. These vendors wouldn’t be making and releasing these tools unless they were being asked for them AND there was going to be stead long term demand.
Turns out that once a companies stuff is in the cloud its users really don’t need MS Windows anymore so as long as you can centrally manage and secure it Linux makes a perfectly fine endpoint OS.
There is one last major bit once you have RMM and EDR in place - centralized identify. Until Okta, Ping, Azure, and Google all have a pam module that allows for remote identity management without depending on LDAP, enterprise endpoints are restricted to desktop/server machines (or orgs where you can get a waiver and only have local login).
Yep but…
Here’s Microsoft - https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/entra/identity/devices/sso-linux?tabs=debian-install%2Cdebian-update%2Cdebian-uninstall
Google has a variety of IDM methods including Ubuntu Authd and Secure Cloud LDAP. There’s also 3rd party tools like JumpCloud, ScaleOrange, etc.
Okta appears to have ASA and OPA although I’m not familiar with either of them. Ping has PingID and Ping Federate, although again I haven’t used either of them.
So depending on your cloud and needs the IdM / IAM is either available NOW or it will be very soon. 😀
Ohh that’s super exciting. I haven’t realized Microsoft made one.
Okta’s offering was garbage last I attempted to poke it. And 3rd party IAM tooling can be completely hit or miss (and let’s not even start about LDAP over the web…)
I don’t understand how my coworkers are using windows. Like, they routinely have issues where it randomly reboots or gets sluggish. And it’s just flat out unfit for software development, unless you’re targeting windows specific stuff. They can’t even run our code locally.
Maybe some of the problems are janky security stuff to try to lock it down
I wish you were right, but that growth does not appear fast nor steady.
0 to 1 percent: 22 years
1 to 2 percent: 8 years
2 to 3 percent: 2 years
3 to 4 percent: more unstable, but between 1 and 3 yearsI would say it’s an encouraging trend.
I had the opposite take as that guy. I already knew that Linux usage in desktops was growing, but I’m pleasantly surprised seeing the dramatic acceleration behind it! I’m being optimistic here, but we could reach the point that we start going up a percentage point in a matter of months in the next few years.
You can buy laptops with pre-installed Linux at Germany’s biggest computer retailer now.
I had no idea - that’s really cool!
Germans also seem to be privacy oriented people, I can imagine this combined with recent developments could have a real impact.
Tuxedo laptops seem like they have a solid build.
Nice design and I think they are based in Germany.
They even provide their own OS which is based on Ubuntu.
Yes, very happy with mine. Started it up to see the preinstalled version of Linux and then restarted it to install Arch btw instead, but it’s a great wee machine, exactly what I wanted and will be replacing it with another like it when the time comes.
My M1 MacBook Air is still alive and kicking (although I dislike being an American brand - bought it before the whole American mess).
But if I was in the market looking for a laptop, definitely would be a Tuxedo.
Dell sells PCs pre-configured with linux as well.
Some OEMs with some models here in the USA also offer it. HP and Dell offer it. I think Dell gives Fedora and Ubuntu? And it takes off ~$130 USD or so from the price, so it’s the full Windows license cost.
Personally if I have that option I’m taking it and just reinstalling whatever I want anyway, but it’s nice having that option.
Also if I’m going to spend $2k+ on a new laptop and they don’t give me a non-Windows/blank OS option then I’d go to support and request a special product link. Otherwise I’ll find another brand or buy used.
Best comment.
I am very thankful to Microsoft, without them I wouldn’t have made the switch to Linux.
I really loving it. So much better, faster and powerful + no Spying.
Yup too late I’m never coming back.
I won when I ditched your mom.
-Dad.
I switched to Linux in December, and it was a remarkable feeling. I don’t think I had really noticed how oppressive or depressive Windows had become (and I hadn’t even switched to Win 11, just using win 10), or how much I was actually personally affected by, but that feeling of suddenly being free when I booted up my linux was quite surprising and exhilarating.
It was like a massive weight had been lifted off of my shoulders.
Good
Hopefully the rest of the industry takes note too
No you didn’t win, they are rebranding their enshitification and tweaking it, it will end in the same spot. Just like minneapolis “won” in getting the feds to somewhat back off of summary executions of citizens under false pretense for the moment. No one was charged, the state is deferring to the feds as if the 10th amendment didn’t make it their duty to prosecute crimes whose precedent would allow federal agents to summarily execute a governor under similar false pretense, contrived altercation, and get away scot free. Or a county prosecutor.
oh so Windows is good now?
As someone with a foot in Windows and Mac, they both suck for different reasons and you’re trading pain in one for pain in the other.
Windows sucks because of all the stupid one drive and AI garbage. No, I don’t want my desktop and tons of other directories in one drive, stop asking me. The constant migration of settings out of control panel is maddening. Windows 10 end of life is fine, but cutting off older PCs from windows 11 for “reasons” was an absolutely horrible choice.
Mac is fine if you do super basic computing, but if you want to do much of anything it’s very annoying out of the box. Window management is annoying unless you get an app like magnet, the ribbon can’t be displayed on dual monitors and there’s no way of fixing the primary monitor, keyboard shortcuts are inconsistent across applications like command delete and keyboard shortcuts in general suck (command + shift + 3-5), the OS greatly dislikes network storage, etc etc. Macs were somewhat isolated from marketing needing a “new” OS every year until recently. Now they’re in the change for the sake of things to list on the new OS page trap.
Linux isn’t without fault, but my experience has been much more pleasant.
Linux has been the best option for 20 years. At least 10 years even for grandmas.
Since I’m a Linux enthusiast, too. This is not correct. Pain free and easy to adopt has it only been in the last years.
Agreed. I could only get on it after it 1. Actually started running the vast majority of video games (Wine and Proton developments mainly post-pandemic) and 2. Had decent performance thanks to Wayland (to this day KDE on X11 using my older GT1030 has embarrassing performance, but I’ve switched to an RX9060 so :3)
No.
I won? Of course I did, I don’t use Windows anymore, I’ve been using Linux for years now.
