Since you asked, and I commented on Lemmy about this before.
Back in the Windows XP and even Windows 7 days Microsoft was trying to sell computers to people. It had to convince people why computers are worth their time.
Fast forward to Windows 10 and now it's, "ok we now got an audience that's addicted to our operating system, lets see what we can get away with. We might lose like 1% to Linux and like 5% to mac doing some of these while most of everyone won't switch at all. and we increase our profits."
Microsoft could care less about your PCs resources when you're idk, playing some 4k or even 8k video games. What a joke, but for real, if any of you use WIndows at home and don't want to jump straight to Linux. You can (temporally jump over to Chromebooks, which will mostly work out of the box, and has support for Linux apps.
Chromebook's I would argue are perfect for getting users use to Linux apps without having to worry about losing any familiarity they might have with Something like WIndows or Mac.
Someone mentioned Libby, which I used before I didn't realized they did magazine subscriptions, and that they are free and legal.
I'm trying out subscribing to some of these. including tech life news, and wired. Something like this where it's updated weekly with new news stories, but you have to wait to a certain time point to access is particularly what I was looking for, this might work out without having to use the newspaper.
I use to care, but then I just use Peertube.
Oh but there's not as much content on Peertube. Put the type of content you like on Peertube make a channel it is free. Another tip is, look for specific types of content, and not specific content creators. and if you happened to find a creator you know or knew, follow them on Peertube!
I have plenty of tech Peertube channels that keep me up to date on Peertube, and it's a type of platform that will never have ads or go a direction I don''t want it to as a whole in terms of federation of servers and being an opensource video platform.
Server can surely make some unwelcomed decisions, and I can just change servers easily. Better then Youtube no ads, and your experience does not get throttled.
I know, but that's what the government will do when they want to try to weaken encryption, they'l give their arguments as to *why they want said law to pass to weaken it.
I'm not saying that's what they *have to do. but rather, it's what they do, tend to do. You are right, their are other ways they *can go about it using existing laws or legal metheds including warants. But that doesn't mean that governments aren't trying to just out right cripple encryption by passing laws, thay had many times before tried this in a notable amount of countries.
I understand why people must protect their encrypted messages at all costs. But the government and others are going to keep using arguments like, "what are people hiding," or "what *could some people be doing to our children."
I would had concern over internet forums disappearing back in 2015-2012, but now a days, I don't worry as much. if it wasn't being replaced by the fediverse. Well maybe not replaced, but it is an alternative that has some good activity surprisingly and still growing, thanks to Mastodons marketing. It's like an upgraded forums. And everyone can communicate no matter where they go on the Fediverse.
I didn't know there *were government-run dating apps. Something I can research about. But this is coming from a u.s perspective. So in other countries, this might be common knowledge within their territory I understand that.
Look, if the posts are on Meta's own platform, and if they say, in their terms of service they say they are aloud to reuse your content to deliver you services while still keeping you the rights. I don't think they are really doing anything illegal necessarily in the u.s.
Other countries absolutely should challenge this in court and find out if this is illegal I do believe the eu found out real quick.
Linux has come along way, there was a time just getting Linux to run, and then to run apps on it was just unmanageable. I mean, you could do it but most people wouldn't want to compile the kernel. Nor would they know where to start to do that, coming from Windows XP or even 7. They'd ask, what's a kernel, and all you had was a terminal, and I assume the terminal wasn't as user friendly as it is now back then but idk about that.
Windows use to just work out of the box, Microsoft used to care back then because in my opinion they were just trying to sell the idea of just using a computer to people. Now that they got people using computers, most with Windows on it then they go to the next phase, make money. The product is less of a concern, but they want to make money off their users.
You can expect Windows to be more modern and up to date on corporate trends, but not so what you want as a user. They aren't trying to sell computers and operating systems any more, they already got people hooked to using their os, that's what they probably cared about back then.
The thing about this price hike is why? They clearly can currently afford to keep the service up with the previous prices. At&t is a scam, time to switch to Sprint, or Verizon. Although pricing may vary per specific location.
Why does Mozilla Firefox need ads, unless they are possibly prepping up their own search engine?
Remember, the CEO once said they wanted to start prioritizing on making money. A search engine, built by Mozilla on the Firefox browser would be perfect, with ads for them.
edit. Another thing, If Mozilla puts ads in Firefox, I believe it would be as easy as just switching to another fork that restricts Mozilla's tracking.
Now if you do, do this. Make sure the fork you go with tries to update as close to the latest Firefox updates as possible, such as security updates for the browser.
I would argue it's not that much of a secret if they're on Twitter but it'l be more difficult (not as hard as if it were encrypted, unless it *is encrypted but I wouldn't know if it was) for law enforcement and advocates to know specifically what people are following. Twitter however essentially allows that content and governments and advocates had been vocal about that fact so the fact people are following certain accounts such as what you named isn't secret, it's just.. which ones are they following?
I know that more kids play video games daily then most adults that work and pay bills, which is besides the point. Most of the time it seems youngers use Discord to communicate then Twiter, when playing games, be regardless of what things might seem.
By removing Twitter from major gaming platforms would make Twitter less relevant to that market which is a lot, over time. It will almost look like Myspace in a sense. (not necessarily that Twitter would be closed down but just that they likely aren't likely going to be using it even willingly, over something like Discord or Instagram.
I think that by having all major console makers abandoning Twitter, that it will keep Twitter / X away from the majority of the younger generations. (which I think would be a good things for those wanting to protect your kids from the content that's allowed to free spread on there.)
Boooo Microsoft Windows