Calling people “toxic” for telling the truth is the most annoying thing about Gen Z. You guys never would have launched any of the necessary revolutions and societal upheavals of history, because you’d just shoot the messenger.

“That Thomas Paine guy is so toxic. I don’t have enough spoons to deal with his aggro bullshit.”

As I mentioned to someone else, look at the world we’re living in. Mood-altering drugs are for situations when nothing is wrong, but you’re sad and numb anyway.

But, ya know, that’s not the case. Look around. Everything is wrong. We all have good reasons to be sad, numb, furious, tired, etc. Therefore, it’s inappropriate to drug ourselves into feeling slap-hap-fuckin’-happy.

That would be like getting into a motorcycle accident, noticing your leg is shattered, with bones sticking out of the skin, and saying “I guess I’ll take morphine forever. As long as I’m feelin’ fine, it’s alllll good.”

No. Not good. Pain and rage are the appropriate and logical responses to our situation. Medicating ourselves into not feeling those perfectly appropriate emotions would just be drug abuse. If I want to abuse drugs, I’ll get them off the street, and pay a way more reasonable price than my health insurance would suck out of my wallet, for their approved happy-feel-good drugs.

solutions to your complaint

Read my question again. I was not asking for “solutions.” I was not asking for tech support. I was asking for the REASON behind Microsoft specifically wanting people to agree to a free upgrade of their OS.

Read through my replies. I have been entirely receptive and cordial toward any speculation on that topic.

What I didn’t want was advice. Or lectures. Or solutions. On the one hand, I was so clear about that point that you referred to my post as a “wall of indignant text.” On the other hand, I guess my wall of text wasn’t big enough, because you still didn’t understand the question.

Again: I was asking about the whys and the hows of the situation. Not solutions to it. And plenty of people have provided good answers.

I disabled all the touchscreen nonsense the VERY DAY that was forced to install Windows 10. It’s still bloated and inefficient and inferior to Windows 7. And 11 will be even worse, even if I can make it look mostly like the current version.

And yeah, I guess I was venting. I was also genuinely wondering if there was some specific benefit that Microsoft would gain from me upgrading, that I hadn’t thought about. The answer seems to be “nah, they just want to be able to advertise to you more effectively, and suck up your data.”

Whatever.

I honestly didn’t 100 percent know the answer. I was seriously wondering if there was some direct, specific reason that I hadn’t thought of. But it’s just the boring speculation that I could have done. I agree I shouldn’t have bothered.

As for toxicity, sure. I’m toxic. The world is toxic. It’s the new fashion. I believe we are all bearing witness to the Great Filter that keeps all civilizations from achieving high technology and exploring the universe (read up on the concept).

In essence, intelligence itself was nature’s greatest mistake. Awareness is a curse. All is vanity. We’re cresting the peak of our achievements, as naked apes, and we will shortly begin the painful process of erasing all our gains, and returning to dust. Good riddance, and I mean that. We are not a good thing for the planet, nor for ourselves.

But I don’t have to be all sweetness and light about any of it.

You seem a bit agitated

I have the misfortune to be living in 2024. If you are not agitated, you are not paying attention.

And I suppose I was looking for a more specific answer than really exists, for this situation. From Microsoft’s perspective, they need me to upgrade, so that I can be part of the current version of their money-sucking system. Whatever. I’ll do it. Who even cares.

Why do you think there is some hidden malicious reason, all software companies want everyone to start using their newest offerings as soon as possible

If they were asking me to pay money for their product, nothing would be suspicious about their behavior. But I’ll be getting it “for free.” And yet they’re acting as if they’re selling it to me.

You don’t think that warrants suspicion?

That’s fair enough. I suppose it’s cost-effective enough to try and nag people to switching, as soon as possible, as I noted in another comment.

It costs money to make a brand-new OS and keep it patched and secure. Why do they want to do that?

I suspect it’s got something to do with selling everyone’s data and/or advertising to them, and/or selling them products and services.

My dude, the first operating system I bought was MS-DOS 6.22. I went miles and miles out of my way, because there was a community college in my area that was (possibly crookedly) selling it to people with the student discount, even if they weren’t students. I have forgotten the exact details, because of all the intervening years.

Then I got Windows 3.1 pre-installed on several machines, then bought the Windows 95 upgrade package, then Windows 98, then XP, then a machine that already had ME, then one that already had Vista, then I bought 7, then I bought 10. They were all annoyingly expensive.

I asked for an explanation, but I got a lecture. Which I fucking knew that I would.

But at least it was a short lecture. Short enough that I bothered reading it, so I guess you got that much over on me. Congrats, I suppose.

I won’t be switching to Linux, though. I am not interested in fixing that last 10%. That’s always what the Linux (and open-source) crowd always wants: at least a little bit of completely free labor, from everyone.

I doubt it. It’ll just be bloated and annoying, for no reason. Even on the new machines.

Boringly, this seems to be the consensus. I actually don’t give a fuck. Advertising doesn’t bother me on the red-hot-rage level that it bothers some people. I am under no obligation to buy anything, just because I’ve seen an ad.

Also, if ads support Windows being gratis, that’s basically okay with me. Having to drop substantial money on operating systems wasn’t fun.

Windows 7 is 15 years old. That’s a long time to go with no new functionality

Did I say they couldn’t add new functionality? They could add whatever the fuck they want. There just wasn’t any reason to change the core system. Nothing about actual computer system architecture has changed over the last 15 years that would warrant that.

New CPUs? They will have drivers. New GPUs? They will have drivers. No problem. Anything else you can possibly think of? Drivers. Drivers will handle it.

There hasn’t been any need to majorly change anything about the core functions of any operating system, for the last 25 years. Conservatively.

There’s talk of advertisements and sponsored links in the very Start Menu, so partnerships with advertisers to get closer to your daily activities?

That’s probably a big part of it. I’ve become so jaded about that whole thing that I’m almost past objecting to it, on any philosophical level. I just wish new Windows versions wouldn’t always add so much CPU and memory overhead.

I mean, shit, I’ve got an almost-four-year-old Android tablet that I use for watching YouTube (and pornography) from the comfort of my bed, and that thing manages to do whatever behind-the-scenes tracking of my activities it wants to do, without sucking up 28 percent of the whole system’s resources, just to run the OS.

And that fucker wasn’t any kind of top-of-the-line powerhouse, when I got it. And I expect to still be using it for at least another year, if not two.

many believe Windows 7 was the last really good version of Windows

That’s not a belief. It’s a fact.

As to why Microsoft wants you to upgrade IDK, maybe because it helps OEMs sell more machines, each with a paid Windows license?

How does that connect to me being borderline tricked into accepting a free “upgrade” on my desktop PC, in my house, over the top of my existing Windows 10 install. They think I’m going to get “hooked” on the new Windows bells and whistles, and go begging my boss to upgrade our workstations, at the office?

Microsoft may also have upped the level of advertising and found more ways to monetize it.

I think this is the bingo. The new version has more and more ways to make money off of user data, selling you services, whatever.

I guess that’s the boringly probable answer. They need to eventually get everyone to switch, before 10 becomes unsupported anyway, so they might as well also try and get everyone onto the new spy-riffic, service-tastic version, as soon as possible.

Boring dystopia vibes.

Imagine if Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich had a daughter. And she grew up to be Prime Minister. But people on the moderate wing of the political spectrum insist that she’s a nice lady, because she’ll pour the tea for everyone, during the meeting where they’re trying to defund all the healthcare, low-income housing, and education programs.