Yes.

If you still want to play such “modern” games loaded with what is akin to spyware, I recommend a dedicated only-for-gaming PC (running Linux of course*) using a different IP address than your main system (probably a notebook), for example by using a VPN on one but not the other. I’d recommend using the VPN for the gaming machine, it’s less of a risk there, it allows for easy circumvention of geo-blocking, etc. If you need to access some services (e.g. chat) from both machines, create a separate account for it. Don’t share account credentials between machines. In fact, act as if the gaming machine is permanently infected with random stuff “required” for modern games, and isolate it accordingly. This is just an idea how to mitigate those problems and don’t let them creep into to your real machine where non-game-related data could leak out as a result. But you’re still going to support the developer doing this which is not recommended.

*) Why still no Windows, in this isolated case, you ask? Well, because it’s important to fight MS’ monopoly on gaming machines, so don’t support it by running it and contributing to its marketshare. Instead, run Linux and enjoy watching Windows’ sinking market share. In fact, if you can, don’t support such games either by not playing them, that would be the ideal solution. But this is written under the presumption that you or your friends still want to play it and you kind of feel left out otherwise.

Yes, but my post is for the people who DO care about privacy issues. I also don’t like the defeatist’s attitude. You can always start making things better. My post is for those who want to make a better informed decision, that’s all.

Yeah, you should use Linux regardless. ;-)

Well this whole area is mostly based on deceit. Like if they claim they MAY do something they will absolutely do it all the time, if they claim they aren’t getting anything from it, it just means they aren’t getting anything directly, but indirectly instead, or from a different involved party. I also like the message at the top of the page: “Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data.”. Under some circumstances you have rights. Which is weirdly accurate. Because in most circumstances, they will just sh*t on data protection rights. Which is also evident by everything being opt-out, rather than opt-in. And then, most likely, even when you disable everything, data will still flow somewhere. Then again, it’s an industry-wide problem. Not specific to Jagex.

Oh yeah, the Crusader games were fun. They probably also aged well. OK, their controls are really annoying and weird, and you kind of have to “cheat” a bit in that game at some points (e.g. by shooting an enemy outside of the screen, so it can’t shoot back, otherwise some situations are really hard). But yeah, fun games, great action, many explosions and mayhem. And since it’s isometric 2D graphics there’s nothing really bad about them either. Except maybe for resolution or aspect issues. Also good sound/music.

Reasons are the data transmissions happening by default and Mozilla’s questionable inclusion of add-on things like Pocket. See for example:

https://www.kuketz-blog.de/mozilla-firefox-datensendeverhalten-desktop-version-browser-check-teil20/

vs.

https://www.kuketz-blog.de/librewolf-datensendeverhalten-desktop-version-browser-check-teil8/ and https://www.kuketz-blog.de/mullvad-browser-datensendeverhalten-desktop-version-browser-check-teil22/

You might need to translate the site to English. If you compare that, you can see why it’s easy to recommend the forks over the original. That said, you CAN configure Firefox to also behave well, but that takes an extra effort. It is far from there by default.

Well, they’re only doing what they announced already like 1-2 years ago. So we knew it was coming. This is also accompanied by Google making YouTube more restrictive when viewed with adblockers. Google is (somewhat late, to be honest) showing its teeth against users who block ads. I always expected it to happen but it took them quite some time. Probably they wanted to play the good guys for long enough until most users are dependent on their services, and now their proprietary trap is very effective.

On the desktop, you should switch to a good Firefox fork right now. Firefox can also be used but needs configuring before it’s good. The forks LibreWolf or Mullvad Browser are already very good out of the box. There’s the potential issue of the forks not being updated fast enough, but so far these two have been fast. Mullvad shares a lot of configuration with the Tor Browser, so using it may break some sites. LibreWolf might be “better” for the average user because of that, but otherwise I think Mullvad is the best Firefox fork overall.

On mobile, Firefox-based browsers aren’t recommended, because on Android, the sandboxing mechanism of Firefox is inferior to that of the Chromium-based browsers. And on iOS, all browsers (have to) run on Apple’s proprietary Webkit engine anyway, but well this is Apple we’re talking about so of course it’s all locked-down and restricted. It’s one of the reasons I don’t even like talking about Apple that much, just be aware that as an iOS user, your choice doesn’t mean as much when it comes to browsers, and your browser might not behave like you think it does on other platforms.

So on mobile, I’d suggest things like Brave, Cromite or Mull. Or Vanadium (GrapheneOS). If the browser doesn’t have built-in adblocking capability which sidesteps the MV3 restrictions, make sure to use an ad-blocking DNS server, so your browser doesn’t have to do it. But you still need it. Adblocking not only helps you retain your sanity when browsing the web in 2024, but it also proactively secures you against known and unknown security threats coming from ads. So adblocking is a security plus, a privacy plus, and a sanity plus. It’s absolutely mandatory. As long as the ad industry is as terrible as it is, you should continue using adblocks. All the time. On every device and on every browser.

The ad industry is itself to blame for this. There could in theory be such a thing like acceptable ads, but that would require ads to be static images/text, not fed by personal data, and not dynamically generated by random scripts which could compromise your security, and not overly annoying. Since that is probably never going to happen, you should never give up using adblockers. Since they basically fight you by reducing your security and privacy, you have a right to defend yourself via technical means.

While this does seem overly restrictive and out of place there, the result of this isn’t bad, because everyone should be at the most recent vesion at all times, period. If you aren’t, you’re exposed to more security holes and bugs. So it’s weird that that program forces you to do that, but it’s still not bad that you’re forced to do it. If you get what I mean. For some less-caring users who’d otherwise never install updates, forced updates are actually a net positive.

Added it, thanks.

Generally, any top rated game from that period which doesn’t rely on “realistic” graphics but instead offers very good gameplay and is kind of timeless and ages well. For example, you shouldn’t play the original System Shock 1 anymore, although it was top tier in 1994, because its graphics are very poor for today’s standards, it’s UI has always been poor, and it’s a game that fully relies on immersion, but you can’t immerse yourself anymore if both graphics and UI are really poor. Instead, play the System Shock remake from Nightdive Studios which came out recently. It’s not the same, but it’s very similar, and much better nowadays. Also why you shouldn’t play the old STALKERs anymore, although they were amazing and it kind of saddens me to write this, but they really don’t offer much immersion today, which is why they didn’t age well. I’m writing this because I didn’t finish part 3 back in the day and intended to finish it like 2 years ago, but I couldn’t stand the dated graphics anymore. For a game which relies fully on immersion, that ruins it.

Here’s my list (not in a particular order), I’m focusing on PC games because I never really play that much console or handheld stuff:

• Command and Conquer up until Red Alert (remastered version available). These are classic RTS games in a sci-fi war setting. Some say Total Annihilation was the best RTS during the 90s but I never played it.

• Starcraft 1 (remastered version available). This game is also still being played competitively in multiplayer, with an active tournament scene, especially in South Korea. Also great in single player. Famous for its balance, at least on modern tournament maps.

• Age of Empires 2 (remastered version available). It’s like a mix between a classic RTS and Civilization. Great game, lots of content by itself already, also tons of added content.

• Jagged Alliance 2 (great community mods available). You can skip part 1, part 2 was absolutely amazing. A great strategy and tactics based game. It’s quite difficult, but great.

• Doom 1+2 (remastered version available, very recently updated again on Steam (this month!)). Plenty of 3rd party engines like gzdoom also available which make them look and feel much more modern. Tons of community-made content as well. Special mention: John Romero, one of the original level designers, also made more content over the years (e.g. “Sigil”), which is great as well.

• Quake 1+2 (remastered version and 3rd party engines available). These were among the first games fully utilizing 3D-accelerated graphics back in the day, so they pushed boundaries and they brought the pseudo-3D games like Doom 1+2 into a full 3D environment.

• Baldur’s Gate 1+2 + its expansions (remastered version available). Also highly recommend version 3 of course but that’s not an old game. Plenty of mods available for them as well. These are all exceptional RPG games with great story and depth that no RPG fan should skip. They also age well because it’s just good 2D art.

• Planescape: Torment (only if you a) liked Baldur’s Gate and b) don’t mind reading (it’s a lot of text) and enjoying a complex story with complex character interactions. Remastered version available)

• Half-Life 1+2 (instead of HL1, play “Black Mesa” which is a great modern remake (not the same, but very similar and much better nowadays). For HL2, there are also some remastered versions or mods available, and Valve updated the game engine from time to time so when you download it today, it’s not the dated version from 2004 anymore). HL1 (1998) was one of the first FPS with a really great story line, voice acting, and stuff like that, which is why it pushed boundaries back when it was released. HL2 was just excellent overall and one of the first or the first game which introduced physics-based object manipulations, so it again pushed boundaries further)

• Sin Gold was a great FPS from 1998 that got brutally overshadowed by Half-Life 1, but it’s still a great story-based shooter, more action-focused. Based on an updated Quake 1 engine.

• Portal 1+2. Best to play them after you’ve played the Half-Lifes. Portal 2 (2012) is THE highest rated game on Steam (https://steamdb.info/stats/gameratings/). Truly great puzzle FPS set in Half-Life’s setting, which is why it’s useful to know about HL before jumping in (but not a requirement). Portal 1 also isn’t far off in rating. Portal 1 was basically a “side game” for the Valve game compilation named The Orange Box, Portal 2 was then a true AAA quality followup because Portal 1 was a huge success.

• Deus Ex 1 (maybe. Graphics are really poor (they were already dated when it launched). But it was one of the first RPG-FPS with stellar level design and the freedom to approach every situation in different ways, so VERY good on the gameplay side). Deus Ex 2 is supposedly bad, so skip that. The newer ones like Human Revolution and Mankind Divided are decent but they’re not classics anymore they’re still “”“fairly recent”“”, around 2010 or so.

• System Shock 2. It also looks very dated by now but there are some HQ mods available (improving models and textures) which make it more bearable. I’m hesitant to mention it because it relies a lot on immersion and it looks very dated. So according to my own recommendations, I probably shouldn’t list it, but it’s also great in level design and gameplay, and its art style never was ultra-realistic to begin with, so I’ll list this one as an exception. It’s very much worth playing, truly a great sci-fi/horror RPG-FPS and a worthy successor to part 1. Nightdive Studios might be working on an SS2 Remake or Remaster, if so then I’d say wait for that!

• Monkey Island 1 + 2. Remasters available. Classic point-and-click adventures, timeless.
• There are even more great adventure games from LucasArts or Sierra back in the day, but you’ll have to figure them out for yourself. I will only recommend Monkey Island because they were probably the most successful and well-known ones. For some of them, remasters are available, or you can play them using ScummVM. There were also other great adventures not from LucasArts or Sierra, like Simon the Sorcerer. The 80s, 90s and early 2000s spawned a lot of great point+click adventure games.

• Diablo 2 (remaster available). D1 started the whole “genre” of hack&slay action RPGs but it’s rather poor in comparison and aged terribly, D2 is much better in all areas, so skip D1 and instead try D2.

• Z (very unique and fun RTS game from the 90s. If you haven’t played it, you should! It offers very good and unique gameplay that no one else really tried to copy as far as I know, which is a shame. It truly emphasizes unit production time, speed and good timing). It’s also entertaining. And difficult.

• Thief Gold + Thief 2 (remasters available I think, but even if not, despite the graphics being very dated, a lot of it is in shadows anyway and IMHO the general art style kind of ages well, though that may be subjective, and it’s also immersion-based, so YMMV, but I think it’s fine still). Also “The Dark Mod” as a community “continuation” of the series). If you like stealth FPS, you must play them. Thief 3 is also decent. Any Thiefs after that are terrible. There are amazing community-made mods/missions as well.

• Alien: Isolation. This one is from 2012 I believe, so not quite old, but an honorable mention because it’s also an amazing stealth-based game. Its art style (like the first movies) also makes it age better. In fact I’d say this is one of the best horror-based stealth games ever made.

• Heroes of Might & Magic 3 (I think in this case, the remaster is bad. Stick to community mods/patches). This one is still the best of the series, so you don’t need to play any other part. Ages very well because it has very beautiful 2D-based graphics. Great art and design overall.

• There was one old RPG which supposedly aged very well but I didn’t play it yet. Maybe Albion or Lands of Lore, not sure what it was.

• Tomb Raider 1-3 (remaster)

• WH40k Dawn of War 1 is great if you like the universe and RTS games in general. Also the best in the series.

• XIII (Thirteen) - but not the new remake, play the original. It’s a rather unique stealth-based, comic-look based FPS. Ages quite well because of its unique look (utilizes the kind of shading like Borderlands)

• Elder Scrolls 3-5 are very good as well but you need several mods or engine enhancements, otherwise graphics aren’t that good anymore, and these are games which rely on good graphics as well for atmosphere/immersion. So they don’t age well by default, but thankfully they have a VERY active modding community which keeps these games alive. You can even make them look very modern, but it takes time and effort to do so.

• Nethack (somewhat of a nerd game, terrible graphics by design (text-based art style), but amazing and very deep/complex gameplay, very rewarding to get into, if you don’t mind its presentation. In terms of gameplay depth it brutally outclasses most games on the market). There are also some other clones like Slash’Em which I didn’t play. Dwarf Fortress is probably similar in depth and presentation (but very different in gameplay and general type of game) but I also didn’t play it yet. If you know enough about Nethack it’s also not that hard, but getting to that point is very difficult and if you don’t know anything then it’s very difficult. (I’ve done 8 ascensions, i.e. 8 finished playthroughs).

• Honorable mention because it’s technically not old but looks old: Return of the Obra Dinn. Don’t skip this one, it’s one of the best games I’ve ever played, I’m not kidding. It’s truly amazing, and it’s made by 1 guy. It’s a perfect example of why graphics fidelity in games doesn’t matter that much and you can create excellent, modern-feeling, stylish games regardless.

“We”, no. “Too many”, yes. In general, hard dependencies on proprietary software or services are often overlooked or ignored as potential future problems. Recent examples of this are Microsoft and VMware. Once the vendor changes things so that you don’t like anymore, or drives up prices like crazy, you’ll quickly realize that you have a problem you can’t solve other than switching, which you might not even be prepared to do short-term.

The Windows world now experiences this because Microsoft is no longer interested in maintaining a somewhat quality operating system, they are mostly interested in milking their user base for data, and don’t hesitate to annoy or even disrupt their user base’s workflows in a try to achieve that goal.

Many Windows users are currently looking at Linux because of this, but the more your whole workflow is based on dependencies to proprietary Windows-only software, the harder your time to switch will be. If you still use Windows today, you should at least start using more open source or cross platform software, which also will work on Linux, because you are on a sinking ship and there will probably be a time when you can’t take MS’ BS anymore and want to switch. Make it easier for you in the future by regarding Linux compatibility in the hard- and software you use today.

https://system76.com/laptops

https://www.tuxedocomputers.com/en/Linux-Hardware/Linux-Notebooks.tuxedo

I hope that our courts in western democracies are strong enough to stop these developments, but I fear they ara not. Once this kind of stuff is being attributed to (even completely unproven) “higher security” or “national security”, and once secret services run the software and identification routines, it will land in the same extra-legal space as internet mass surveillance already lives in: “No no, we’re not doing that. Okay, you got us, we’re doing it, but only in limited scope. Okay, you got us, we’re doing it on everyone, but it’s important for national security and we can’t disclose anything else”. And that’s usually when nothing can be done anymore about this, and laws and ethics will be outmaneuvered.

Long-time GrapheneOS user here.

Can’t say anything about Motorola gestures.

Banking apps MIGHT not all work on GrapheneOS, if unsure check first, or ask on the GrapheneOS forum. I forgot the reasons but it’s probably something stupid like the banking app blocking any non-“Google-sanctioned” Android versions via the Play Integrity DRM kind of feature. It sucks, especially because GraphneOS is way more secure and private than any commercial Android, but what can you do, bad decisions are being done all the time.

GrapheneOS is my recommendation, it’s easy to install and can be used by tech-illiterate people as well because almost none of its security and privacy enhancing features require any special configuration work from the user or require advanced knowledge, it all happens mostly in the background with good default settings. Even for tech-savvy people this has the advantage of not requiring any tinkering or maintenance work, it feels like using any proprietary Android, just hardened and much more privacy-friendly.

You should still maybe be aware of these potential minor issues:

• Some apps might refuse to work on any “unsanctioned” Android version via the Play Integrity thing, but so far this seems to be very rare (thankfully). If you find any, make sure to tell the developers that they should stop doing that.

• Some apps might simply require Google Play services to be installed. On GrapheneOS, you can install them via the “Apps” app, and they will be slightly less terrible than they are on any other Android because they won’t run with full system rights, but instead they’ll be sandboxed and can be completely shut down by using the standard permissions system, which the user is blocked from doing on proprietary Android systems. But then again, if you must use them, then of course they’re going to require Network permission and they’ll use that to phone home to Google, as they always do on standard Androids as well. So it’s not recommended to install any proprietary apps from Google on top of GrapheneOS. Even though on Graphene, the amount of things an app is allowed to do is more limited compared to the huge amount of data an app can read and phone home on a propreitary Android system.

• Some apps include certain widgets like Google maps which, again, require the respective app or Play services app to be installed as well. Depending on how these apps are written, they might simply fail completely when this dependency is not there. But so far, I’ve had luck, and some apps I’ve used which integrate a Google maps widget still worked without it. So it depends on the app and the quality of its developers.

• When not having the Google play services installed (default), you won’t have access to Google’s push notification system in the cloud. Some apps, even some privacy-respecting apps like Signal, rely on that. Signal will work without, but then it uses a power-inefficient alternative based on websockets instead, which means Signal without Google play services drains your battery faster than it would otherwise. There are ways around this by using the Molly fork of Signal (Signal is open source and there is at least this one fork often being used as well) with the open source app “ntfy” and an either self-hosted or a privacy-respecting ntfy server instance somewhere to go along with it, which will then act as your own push notification server in the cloud. So you don’t need to contact Google’s stuff for that, and less connections overall to Google equals more privacy overall.

• If you do decide to install the Google play services app on Graphene, make sure to allow it to run in the background. But, again, it’s not recommended to use any proprietary Google apps/services.

• Once you have Graphene installed, be sure to use its integrated browser called Vanadium (a hardened Chromium fork) to download and install an “app store” of your choice. When I first started out, I installed the F-Droid apk first, then from within it Aurora as a Play Store client. Giving me access to a lot of open source and Play Store apps, respectively. F-Droid unfortunately has some potential disadvantages, which is why I recommend using Obtainium instead of the F-Droid client (you’ll still access the F-Droid repository sometimes because some APKs of open source apps are only hosted there, but at least you’ll avoid potential issues with the F-Droid frontend application then). Using Obtainium instead of F-Droid will be slightly more work at the beginning when compiling your needed open soruce applications, but afterwards it’s just as easy.

• Make sure to configure a privacy-friendly and ad/tracker-blocking DNS server, as well as something like RethinkDNS or NetGuard Pro to control which apps are allowed to contact which hosts/IPs. Otherwise, while Graphene itself won’t violate your privacy, many apps will still do that (especially proprietary apps often contain several trackers).

• If you need tutorial videos on how to install or initially configure Graphene, or Obtainium, watch the youtube channel “Side of Burritos”, excellent content.

If any of that sounds scary, it shouldn’t be. Most of these issues are really minor and it’s unlikely that you’ll be too negatively impacted by any of it, so give Graphene a try without Google services. There are great open source apps out there for all sorts of functionality. Just felt I should mention any potentially small pitfalls.

Other Android variants or ROMs are inferior to GrapheneOS in terms of security and privacy, unfortunately, so it’s best to buy a cheap Pixel (8th generation recommended due to strong hardware-based security) and install Graphene on it. Otherwise you’ll miss out on Graphene’s very strong security and privacy features. There are some other privacy and security oriented Android variants like Calyx or /e/OS or things like that, or even LineageOS, but they all, again, don’t reach up to Graphene’s level of security and privacy.

HTH

RethinkDNS is probably better, but I’m currently still using NetGuard Pro and kind of happy with it, but I will soon migrate to Rethink DNS. If you use NetGuard, make sure to use the Pro version, download its hosts file and use it in whitelist mode and display all contacted hosts/IPs for each app (block everything by default, allow only the technically necessary connections!). The more proprietary apps you use, the more tracking hosts you’ll see being contacted (lots of proprietary apps contact Google, Meta, etc.). Don’t allow these connections.

Remember that this is just one case in isolation. US-based data hoarders like Google, Meta, Microsoft, and so on are also regularly sued for various privacy law violations. And they all deserve it equally, TikTok included. I hope no one is left out. That said, unfortunately, the punishment is often a joke, which means these companies simply pay it out of their pocket change and then continue doing the exact same stuff. For example, France sued TikTok for something like 5 million $. Unless that number goes into the billions at least, I bet it’s still way more profitable for those companies to continue to absolutely sh*t on anything privacy related. So, in essence, nothing will change because of this. Not for US-based data privacy violators, not for Chinese-based. “Same shit, different country” has never been more fitting.

Get an external drive, it’s useful to have lying around for those rare occasions where you have something on an optical disc.

Arch breaking easily is such an over-exaggeration. I’ve run Arch so many years and the amount of tinkering I’ve had to do because of botched updaates is so minimal. Often times, they announce it on their main website even, with instructions on how to fix it. You also should have configured filesystem snapshots to easily revert after a bad update. Or have a USB installation medium ready to boot from and then repair/downgrade the affected bad package. That’s usually all there is to do, and it happens rarely.

If you have multiple problems after Arch upgrades, then I’d guess that’s a misconfiguration on your end, leading to unstable system behavior after updates. Arch doesn’t do any kind of hand-holding, you’re allowed to completely misconfigure and break your system, but then it’s also your own fault.

If you didn’t update for a while, you should probably update the archlinux-keyring package first, then do the rest of the updates. Otherwise, the other packages won’t be able to be updated when package signing keys changed in the meantime

So yeah, I wouldn’t recommend Arch for beginners, unless you really want to learn Linux the “hard way” and have a little bit of spare time and don’t mind reading on the Wiki, but still, Arch instability is kind of over-exaggeration. Arch is very stable for a rolling release distro, but you do have to do a little bit of maintenance every now and then. That’s the nature of rolling-release. I still wouldn’t call that unstable, though.

If the user is at least somewhat competent, antivirus is normally not needed. Antivirus has several issues on its own, before even considering its defense “capabilities”: it can contain spyware itself (harvesting user data, auto-uploading “interesting” files to the AV vendor cloud which leaks personal data, etc… e.g. Avast was recently caught spying on the web browser traffic of all their user base and then selling that data. Yes, that’s an AV vendor you’re supposed to trust), AV (like all software) has security holes which can be exploited (there was already malware which only worked BECAUSE you had an AV installed, and it wouldn’t have worked if you hadn’t), and you have one more process constantly running in the background with lots of access rights which isn’t great either, it may even damage your system by finding and quarantining false positives, and if your system is already infected then any AV running on it is also compromised as well and won’t find certain malware anymore because the malware can hide its processes from the AV. Furthermore, AV is only somewhat good at detecting past threats, not good at all at detecting current, dangerous threats. (Typically, virus writers test their own creations against current AV anyway, ensuring that they don’t detect it). Also, no AV detects e.g. Windows 10+/MS Office/MS Edge/Google Chrome/etc.'s invasive telemetry, which is (in this case) a euphemism for spyware functionality bundled with an otherwise legitimate application. AV should at least warn about it, otherwise it doesn’t live up to its promises of combating spyware at all.

All in all, a competent user is likely to have more security/privacy issues or trouble WITH an AV, than without it. Which means, in the hands of a competent user, AV is the only thing on the system which behaves the most like malware. So simply by learning and following good security practices, you can avoid most if not all threats coming your way anyway, without any additional software needed on your machine.

That said, if the user is quite incompetent and executes everything at random and doesn’t really care what sites he visits or what phishing mails he opens, and generally has a carefree attitude when workilng at the device, then having an antivirus constantly scanning everything and maybe avoid execution of a known threat, can do more good than harm.

If you’re ever unsure, upload the file in question to virustotal.com - it will scan with something like 30 antivirus engines. You can’t do that on your own. That makes it more likely that something is found, if there is a known threat in it. Or ask on a forum. If you’re unsure your own system is infected, scan it with an offline virus scanner booted from a USB drive (preferably also with multiple scan engines), because scanning from inside an already infected system cannot ever guarantee full recovery. Although, no AV can ever guarantee full recovery regardless, which is why in the end you should completely re-install any infected system, and not rely on one AV’s cleaning capability. Because there’s no guarantee that the AV found and cleaned everything. If the malware contained a backdoor then maybe there’s new, undetected malware already present as well.

Well, Linux is like a juggernaut that’s inching ever closer in all sorts of areas (while already dominating in some areas). The time frame where it makes sense for Microsoft to spend increasing amounts of resources to maintain and further develop Windows is closing, and if you look closely, they’ve pretty much shown that Windows is not at all priority #1 anymore since at least Nadella became CEO. We also live in a world which is increasingly becoming OS agnostic, which is bad for Windows’ dominance and great for Linux, MacOS, and others (because there’s less and less relevant applications specifically requiring Windows). Of course, Linux on the desktop also grows stronger and more mature year after year, which further accelerates the change.

There will also be some points in time which hugely accelerate things, like Valve going all-in on Steam Deck and Proton and to make Steam a more independent store/community platform, and also Microsoft making Windows worse and more user-hostile over time. From a business perspective, it makes sense for MS - they want to go full cloud (= full control), almost full removal of control for the user, and full ingestion of as much data from the user as they can - to sell it, utilize it for own purposes, and train AIs with it. It’s what increases profits in the short-term. A lot of companies are doing that kind of stuff. MS is just one of the more ruthless ones, which, again, makes sense, because they still have a big userbase to exploit. In the long-term, they’re damaging, no, DESTROYING Windows’ reputation as a half-decent OS (even among Windows fans) and driving more and more users to the alternatives. It’s kind of inevitable. MS’ striving for profit has doomed Windows, and soon, when no single company will be able to compete with the ever evolving Linux ecosystem anymore, Windows is also doomed. It’s kind of a law of nature now. It’s not a question of if, just when.

(I’ve used both Windows and Linux extensively, Windows since MSDOS/Win3.x, Linux since 1998. About 10 years ago, I’ve switched exclusively to Linux and banned Windows into a VM only that gets booted less and less [I think it’s been off for 2 years already]). I, for one, welcome our new old Linux overlords.