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by eadmund 251 days ago
If customers keep trying to do something … let them do it? Charge them to do it?

It’s crazy to me: folks quite clearly want to run Windows 11 without an account. What is it worth to Microsoft let someone do that? $12? $144? $1,728?
3 comments
CamperBob2 251 days ago
The problem is, the more you're willing to pay, the more you're worth to them.

(Which is also why so many services don't let you pay to get rid of ads.)

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avhception 251 days ago
That's a bit like asking to get a "smart" TV without the spyware / adware. Sure, you could pay more! But they can also just take both your money and that other money. What are you gonna do, buy a non-"smart" TV? :)
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maples37 250 days ago
I recently bought a Samsung television, which came with a bunch of the smart nonsense. During the whole setup process I was thinking "I have made a mistake, I need to return this ASAP" but forced myself to continue clicking "no" through the setup screens.

After about 5 minutes of setting up (never once connected to Internet), it's pretty much exactly what I wanted: a display for broadcast TV and for HDMI inputs. A pretty good one, too. The only "tricky" part was getting it to remember the last channel/input at power-on instead of going to it's "home" screen, but that was just a setting in a menu somewhere, not particularly hard to find (though I'm the kind of person that does a depth-first-search through the entire menu tree just to see what all is there).

I think the key is never letting it get a taste of internet. No internet, no ads :) The internet-related things I do want to watch (like youtube, etc) are easily accomplished through the Linux PC I have connected.

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mschuster91 250 days ago
> What are you gonna do, buy a non-"smart" TV? :)

These exist and are called "digital signage" - usually these things got far brighter and more durable panels, downside is they usually hover around 2x the price of an ad delivery device.

Plug in your old Chromecast 4k or Apple TV, that's it.

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npteljes 250 days ago
>folks quite clearly want to run Windows 11 without an account.

Do they significantly impact the bottom line though - especially compared to what possibly they gain by these actions? Corporations can tolerate a bit of grumbling on some tech forums.

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