I am seriously considering buying an older car (2017) that doesn’t have the tracking or connectivity in it. (Aside from CarPlay). I don’t want to pay twice for my heated seats. And buttons. I want buttons.

Yes, I think I’ll sign up for the…hm, the “Casual Gamer” tier, which allows 2 hours per week of gaming. Although I could always watch an ad to unlock 30 more minutes.

Please drink verification can

It already is.

For years, I was predicting that the TPM 2.0 requirement for 11 was going to mean that Microsoft would end up extending the security update end-of-life for years, just like they ended up doing with Windows 7.

However, what I didn't predict was that instead of making that available to everyone like they did with 7, they're now going to make consumers pay for the benefit of continued security updates on Windows 10. They're just using it as an opportunity to demand more money.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/whats-new/extended-security-updates

Individuals or organizations who elect to continue using Windows 10 after support ends on October 14, 2025, will have the option of enrolling their PCs into a paid ESU subscription. The ESU program enables PCs to continue to receive critical and important security updates through an annual subscription service after support ends. The Microsoft Security Response Center defines the severity rating for security updates.

They used to only charge organizations for this, now they've decided the regular users have gotta pay, too.

Honestly Im not really sure how profitable that would be for them. Most people dont really think about their computer OS much, they use windows because thats what they know how to use, because their computer came with it and they've not tried anything else. Businesses might think more about what they use, but their employees know windows and training them on other things would take time and money, so they too use windows. But if windows becomes a recurring subscription instead of something you buy bundled with the computer itself, then that would force people to think more about it, and potentially seek alternatives, like Linux or whatever else might come up. More use of those alternatives would lead to more software being made that supports them in order to not lose those sales, which in turn makes non-windows OS's viable to more people, which would cause more people to actually switch to them, and so on. This could eventually lead to business customers eventually deciding it would be viable to try something else, which could ultimately lose Microsoft money. Being the "default" OS gives them an effective near-monopoly on that market, they would be pretty foolish to risk that I would think, especially when as you already mentioned, other ways of monetizing those home pc users like ads, or for that matter selling data to advertisers, already exist.

I mean, isn't it already? You gotta pay the upgrade every few years, and they only give it away when the new product is worse than the old product.

I'd give it 12 months.

I think it would be similar to Office.

For example, there would be Windows with a subscription for the activation key. You would continue to get a period of free use (14 or 30 days maybe) before requiring an activation key.

Manufacturers would bundle new hardware purchases with 24 months of credit or something like that, so most people wouldn't notice a change at first.

However, Windows "Classic" would still exist and allow one-off purchases, but may have some limitations to updates or features over time.

Windows is just the vehicle to distribute their yearly subscription of the office package. It's already a freemium model. You can't outrace greed with your worst-case musings.

I'd say about the same time Linux installations trend up aggressively.

When a large proportion of their user base no longer believes/ knows/ cares that they actually have a choice. Or that a small hit in convenience or familiarity is worth the gain in liberty and personal freedom.

This kind of already exists. Microsoft 365 is basically office 365 with an included Windows license (and a few other perks) . I don't know if they're pushing it in the consumer space, but they seem to be trying to get businesses to switch.

It's only a matter of time before that becomes normal, I'm so excited for the days when computers come with a trial of ms365 and force you to pay after it expires. Or better yet, buy "extended coverage" to get double the time for triple the price!