You can just turn that off. You know that, right?

EDIT: also, the icon doesn't show up in the position the OP's screenshot shows it, at least not in my experience. It showed up right next to the start button for me, but you CAN move it around the taskbar if you want.

@AnActOfCreation You can re-enable it in the Taskbar settings, though (as you also can hide Copilot the same way?).

I still don't even see copilot on my win11 machine. I'm up to date as far as I know. Am I supposed to have it by now?

I just use my windows PC for gaming, and it does the job without issues.

Maybe here is a good place to ask. I have used Mint for months now on my non-gaming laptop. I like it. I was ready to move my gaming rig at months end. Then I read that it can have issues with multiple monitors at different refresh rates and also with Mouse acceleration. Is this true and is there a solution?

A decision that also lightly favors business as the "hide desktop" button has a general reputation as the "uh oh, the boss is coming!" button. Definitely not their first purpose here, but a "nice" side benefit for the pro-enshittification crowd.