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My other biggest gripe: what happens to business computer users at the office? What about their admins? How much extra work is this going to create???
Enterprise and SMB always have practical workarounds that consumers do not need to deal with.
The only way to create a local user account on windows 11 now without fuckery is pretending you are going to domain join. No other method exists without under the hood tweaks. A similar workaround would work.
But none of this actually protects kids. The goal is to have total surveillance over as many users as possible in their home life. Enterprise is already handled by m365 and google workspace after all.
The only way to create a local user account on windows 11 now without fuckery is pretending you are going to domain join. No other method exists without under the hood tweaks. A similar workaround would work.
Depending on your definition of “under the hood”, this isn’t really accurate. You can invoke CMD to create an account or enter Audit mode to do the same. Neither of these methods require preparation of separate installation media.
Can't you only join a domain on the Pro versions of Windows, too?
Ohhh trust me I know it's all about surveillance. I'm just meaning they're going to negatively impact everyone everywhere without a second thought because they'll get what they want in the end. Either more money or more reelections
But I don't use windows 11, still using a local account just fine.
I use CachyOS, but for the vanilla home user "I bought a laptop!" at bestbuy or whatever the fuck, there's no local account option anymore. It's connect to the internet and sign in with microsoft, and nag you constantly every 3 days until you activate onedrive and other microsoft services.
I got an ARM64 laptop through work to test to see how it might work as an experiment and this has been how the device behaves from day 1. It's a nightmare.
Does windows no longer let you use a PC without the internet? I don't normally buy PCs with an OS and install my own on them.
No worries, all this IT stuff is going away with the banning of VPNs
This basically makes using VPNs for privacy useless. Now they will have a record of every IP address you ever used. They can also use local laws internationally. Like if your state has age verification or bans certain sites, they can just use your ID to ban those websites or apps even if you aren't in the country.
This is horribly bad...
Can someone ELI5 this for me please? I'm clearly not getting what's going on
State-level bills have heretofore only required OSes to ask a user if they are of majority age. A federal bill is likely (based on the groups backing and who proposed it) to require OSes to validate (i.e. have users prove, not just assert) their ages.
Depending on what mechanisms are mandated, and who they target punishment at, it could lock 99% of users (who are not willing or capable to use means to bypass this) into tying all their actions online to a government-run database.
It's not enough that means to bypass it exist; the government shouldn't be able to mandate this kind of control, and shouldn't be propagating the expectation that this behavior and level of control is normal or acceptable.
This bill, if passed, will force operating systems to verify the age of the user. This means the verification uses a government issued ID.
It's the mechanism apparently being impossible to be cheated on what I don't understand. Or maybe I'm just hopelessly confused.
I should have replied under the post instead of under your comment, but it was your comment the one triggering the oh wait what moment for me, sorry. Don't feel like you have to give me an answer if I'm not making any sense
this post was submitted on 16 Apr 2026
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