I thought M$ was moving everything to "web code" so they would only have to maintain a single app architecture across the entire internet to feed their cloud data mining machine and somehow sucker most users into paying for Windows desktop as a thin client for web access.

The idea of returning to real development of native Windows applications means that corporate customers were very unhappy with the results of web/cloud first push.

Obligatory questions to Microsoft, in this order:

How can I stop it from happening?
How can I remove it?
How can I disable it?
How Can I turn it off ?

What if I want to be the agent of my like and my communications? Where is control of my agency in this scenario?

I want robots to do menial tasks like mowing my yard quietly at night, doing the dishes, cleaning the floors, self-driving cars etc. Not deciding for me what groceries will show up at my door and, consequently, accept what meal I've been assigned to eat.

Some humans like making decisions and coursing their own lives, but maybe that is soon to return to the realm of the power elite.

Feels good, doesn't it? Having control over something. No one tell you when you can and can't use it. Or today it's and extra $2 for access. You can even charge others to use it or freely share it. The choice yours.

Corporations really don't want us to own anything anymore, because ownership is power.

U.S. law puts a heavy thumb on the scales of justice when it comes to property rights.

This U.S. administration is turning out to be the most successful mob racket of all time.

Unless you mean teaching the software in your English class (days of instruction), you are very mistaken.

Not having to hand write papers is a god send! I handed in a typed rough draft to my high school English teacher (which she didn't much care for; I was confused about that). After her review, I may have spent 10-20 minutes fixing the paper and printed it out.

I saw much of this roll out first hand and predicted it wouldn't end well for most students, schools and communities. Some schools even cannibalized their own student population, teachers and finances to present a single, successful, high achieving school/program to game state reporting and lure back parents who sent their kids elsewhere.

1. The personal computer revolution of the 80s and 90s was real and a bunch of motivated individuals interested in it made a lot of cool things and a lot of money.
2. The foreseeable future will involve computers, especially for the college track.
3. Early 2000s, success stories come out about low/under performing schools finding success with 1:1 or very low student to computer ratios.

Here the problem with point 3: The test/pilot schools functionally had unlimited money and resources in the forms of grants and/or vendor subsidies to ensure their pilot programs succeeded. Additionally, the pilot schools were cherry picked to increase the likelihood of success.
1. The teachers and staff were well trained to use the tech
2. There was no shortage of tech for the pilot program
3. The curricula was customized to incorporate the tech from the outset
4. Teachers and staff were trained on the new curricula
4. Computers were only part of the "fix"

Many schools believed if the could get close to 1:1 with the right pieces of educational software and analytics, it will fix their core educational problems which were due, in large part, to historical poverty and lack of equal resources. For most schools, it is/was unsustainable.

Then there came "keeping up with the Jones". "The school district up the road has better tech, so we need better tech."
Enter even more budget cuts to staff (fewer aids, kitchen workers, janitors etc.), facilities (HVAC, furniture, plumbing etc.), books, buses etc.

Other issues:
1. How can you charge a couple hundred laptops at a 20-50 year old school with inadequate electrical infrastructure? Charging carts with fancy timers = $$$$
2. Early 2000s, not all schools had adequate wi-fi. Wi-fi network build out = $$$$
3. On hand spare laptops, ready to go? $$$$
4. Lost, damaged, stolen laptop replacements? $$$$ (don't even try to argue insurance or holding the parents accountable)
5. Are students staying on task on the computer? Monitoring/lock software = $$$$
6. Managed student accounts? $$$$
That's the short list.

If you don't have the full community buy-in and the money to fund it for 5-10 years, you don't really have a chance and your messing with our children's education.

From what I've read across nearly all end user AI stories are 2 main things.
1. AI is meant to replace a certain type of previously human only task
2. AI supplements a knowledge worker's efficiency

To focus on point 2, you can't be truly efficient with AI if you are not knowledgeable enough in the source material to cut through poor or incomplete AI output or input proper iterative prompts. Without that, your likely spending more time cleaning up after AI and doing actual research/data gathering when you probably could have done it yourself from the outset.

It's so cute you thought "property rights" were meant for you and me. The ruling class has always had a desire to own everything and return to feudalism or slavery. Capitalism is/was a modern way to amass wealth and property, while providing scraps and limited opportunity to "climb the ladder" for us plebs while the ruling class figures out the next government/religion/financial method to stay in control.

I also want the online/network openess, not only "if you manually transfer files". Not just one feature, but all features.

If I'm going to have a 60" black mass on my wall, I'd rather it display art.

That being said, I want it to display what I want it to display and not require someone elses infrastructure etc. It needs to support local storage option (USB storage) as well as an API to call photos from what ever service or host I chose that supports free or cheap API access. Random pictures from a local NFS server. It should never require calling the mothership or an account to simply use baked in features; all such features should be baked in.

I'm sure this is all just a misunderstanding by Spotify and they drop it once they learn the "extremists" were simply collecting data to train their AI model. Hell, Trump may even preemptively pardon them for AI or something.

Hey "businesses", remember how you were too cheap to get a simple website hosted, so you just set up Facebook because it's "free"? Well, it would be a shame of something happened to all those links you post on Facebook...

I think there are several factors at play here. Possibly the most important factor is transacting without cash, i.e. electronic payments.
I'm not here to argue the reason to tip or not to tip.

Because so many of us no longer, reliably carry cash; systems have defaulted to allow you to tip for services yet to be delivered. In theory, if you tip ahead of service delivered, you are sending a signal to the service provider that you expect something above the base line. Broadly speaking, this is no longer true in U.S. tipping culture; the tip is expected. With recent price increases across the board (goods, services and wages) the likes of Uber and Dordash are trying their damndest to show you the bare minimum you will pay to get food delivered. They use tricks like not asking if you'd like to tip before the good or service is delivered. They rely on humans to be selfish and not tip after the good or service is delivered because the transaction was already expensive enough; just enough to keep paying for the service. This works because the delivery agent doesn't know if their tip wil come as cash at the door, added on to the electronic transaction or not at all. Furthermore, I doubt there is "bad tipper" list for delivery workers to follow. The customer faces no real consequence for not tipping. Uber and Doordash always get paid even if the delivery agent gets no tip. Uber and Dordash are not incentivised to get customers to tip delivery workers as long as delivery workers are desperate for the meagar wages.

It could also be a 2 year probation period for the "partner companies" evaluate potential hires and siphon off federal employees that cut the mustard with no real risk to the companies.