Technology

59641 readers

2694 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

Follow the lemmy.world rules.
Only tech related content.
Be excellent to each another!
Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
Politics threads may be removed.
No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

933

Windows 12 May Require a Subscription (www.pcmag.com)

submitted 1 year ago by billiam0202@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

668 comments fedilink hide all child comments

[A]n INI configuration file in the Windows Canary channel, discovered by German website Deskmodder, includes references to a "Subscription Edition," "Subscription Type," and a "subscription status."

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] Hotzilla@sopuli.xyz 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

I agree, corpo world is already 100% in subscription mode and consumers buy windows through OEM. If you buy OEM laptop, how would you sell subscription windows with it? I see it as a no go, it would force OEM laptops to be sold with Linux.

If you sell updates through subscription, you would end up in 2000's when malwares infected the whole internet with non-patched windows machines. This hurts your PR so poorly that I don't think they are that stupid.

Of course they are thinking their ass off how they could convert consumers to subscription, but I don't see way to do it.

[–] AssPennies@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If you buy OEM laptop, how would you sell subscription windows with it?

"SomeShittyAntivirus free for 12 months with purchase of this laptop!"

s/SomeShittyAntivirus/Windows/g

[–] Hotzilla@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 year ago

What happens when the trial ends? Windows won't load? Would brands like Dell/HP/Fujitsu/Acer really agree that, their customer service would be full of old people complaining that their laptop is not working.

[–] Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

My guess is that MS will figure out a different approach. Maybe the enterprise versions are behind a subscription while the consumer version stays the way it currently is. They could also take the Apple approach. Offer a little bit of something for free (like iCloud) and charge if you want more of it. There could also be specific features that are not available if you don’t pay (like Apple Music). MS could offer a certain part of consumer windows for free, and charge for some other part, like advanced settings.

[–] Hotzilla@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 year ago

Corporate are already in subscription mode, pretty much all companies have some sort of per user subscription with MS. E3/E5/F3 etc licenses include windows+m365+office+defender etc.

[–] rambaroo@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The article addresses literally all of your points. Installing windows would be free for oems so it's actually good for them, and MS would probably offer a free tier with ads for end users who don't want to pay.

To me that's completely believable and sounds exactly like something MS would do.

[–] Hotzilla@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 year ago

Probably AD free+AI features are behind subscription, and in sense I would be Ok with it.