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I honestly believe a developer’s Hippocratic Oath about 20 years ago as a standard would’ve gone a long way but ¯_(ツ)_/¯ here we are
Windows Latest previously reported that some Windows 11 PCs ship with malware built in that not even a clean install through the wrong region setting can avoid, and Microsoft told us at the time that they were aware of the behavior and looking into it. 3 years later, the company still hasn’t closed the door on OEMs using their own update pipeline to push ads.
This is supposed to be literally the selling point of a gated app store -- they app store owner makes sure the apps available do not do anything negative to the user. If it fails this basic function, then why put up with it?
What? No it's not. The selling point of the app store is the owner of the app store gets to rent seek. Getting to control the app store is the selling point of developing an 'OS' for free.
You as the user are just the product.
It’s probably worth pointing out that Windows has very much not been developed for free. Up until Windows 8 and still today in some cases Windows license cost in the neighborhood of $250, and there are parts of the OS that have not changed since Windows 95, the format hard drive dialogue for instance. That’s before we even start mentioning how much they took from IBM to develop Windows secretly while helping IBM develop OS/2.
The App Store itself was the product of a creation of a unified code base between Xbox and Windows Phone and Windows and Windows RT, Then they threw that out with the bathwater because fuck Windows Phone for some reason.
Windows was sold that's true and as you say the app store came with the attempt at a mobile / tablet OS.
Windows is well into the extract phase of the product. Microsoft missed the mobile boat and fewer and fewer people are buying laptops. Grandma gets by on a tablet etc. so things are just going to get worse and worse for Windows users going forward.
I’m not sure I made my point very well:
There was no attempt at making a mobile or tablet OS, they actually succeeded in unifying the code base. To this day there is only one operating system and it runs everything that runs “windows”. This is no different than the way Linux works or Apple’s Darwin works. That’s what they set out to achieve at Windows Vista and what they succeeded at around the time of the Xbox One. At that time, I as a developer could write one app and it would run on a Windows phone, a Windows tablet, the Xbox, and Windows PCs. Then they chose to kill that paradigm in favor of what we have today.
That’s what I was trying to point out, this was an intentional choice. They could go back to making Windows phones and tablets and shit and letting the unified app platform work the way it was supposed to at any time but they continue to choose not to.
hp's been pulling this same stunt for years to install their "telemetry" and other bullshit on desktops and laptops, even after a 'clean' install to a blank drive using microsoft's installer
I've been on Linux for 6 months now full time. I have a small windows install to play Battlefield and Marathon when I feel the urge.
Using linux has been eye opening. Feeling ownership over my PC and not being bombarded with bullshit is so refreshing.
It's not perfect, Linux has plenty of issues due to it not being the market leader, but it's a lot less frustrating when Linux is broken because it's not broken on purpose, whereas at this point I very much feel windows is shit on purpose.
Isn't it wonderful? Been on it a couple of years now and my only complaint is that I didn't switch sooner.
It feels like what owning a PC was always supposed to be like. Complete control.
Switched back in my teens and didn't look back. In those days getting stuff running was so much harder too. Now we have stuff like proton and lutris.
*installs spyware
Why would a monitor even have an app?
Some high-end professional monitors have really sophisticated colour calibration tools, and perhaps a gaming monitor might allow you to automatically configure HDR or refresh rate on a per-app basis. I don't think it's unreasonable that a monitor might have some software. The problem is automatic installation of shitware that you can't get rid of again. Fuck LG, fuck Windows for allowing it.
To show you ads of course
I have some old LG monitors. Will they also be affected by this?
According to the Gamers Nexus video, yes, monitors up to 3 years old could be affected
Ok, mines like 15 years old. Thanks for the info.
Probably not if you’re running Linux.
this post was submitted on 21 Jul 2026
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