I don't actually use Apple Store all that often. A fair portion of the software I have installed, like LibreOffice and Firefox is just installed via DMG images. It kicks up a window about unrecognized source, but then just works. iOS devices are definitely more locked down, but the Macs are really no different as far as installing software than Windows or Linux.

I imagine the Mac Neo is the real source of their panic. Right now RAM prices are probably saving them from even more losses, but the hegemony is coming to an end. If a credible useful, at least for average users, non-Windows platform using smart device level hardware can sell as well as the Neo has, I'd say Microsoft's reckoning is finally upon them.

At what point in this long and seemingly endless list of fixes to even the most basic usability features in Windows do its users finally admit it is really a shitty and badly maintained operating system. I use Gnome or MacOS, which are streamlined and uncluttered, and then I head over to Windows and it's like looking into the mind of someone with severe ADHD. It's a colossal mess where nothing particular makes sense, there's no coherent approach, everything is slow and inundated with advertising, context menus that worked for decades don't function right or at all, even the simplest tasks just seems to land you in the wrong place.

I suppose under the hood it's still a fairly decent operating system, although tools like Powershell, which can be achingly slow itself, demonstrate that there's a lot of layers of cruft.

I don't play video games, and frankly Office isn't that much better for my needs than LibreOffice, and Outlook is a bloated pile of crap, so I rarely even access the Windows desktop I have at work via RDP, save for two applications I rarely use. Windows is rapidly becoming irrelevant in my world.

I would say that any kind of substantial level of investment in a jurisdiction is a reasonable indicator of an expectation of a return on investment, and thus confidence in the economic growth of at least some industries in that jurisdiction. I'm not sure why people are trying to hand wave away that kind of an indicator, unless the fact of it creates some problem for some narrative they have bought into, creating a level of cognitive dissonance necessitating peculiar denials.

Yeah, but that will happen with your Kodak scooter and Bell and Howell Fire extinguisher too, which are the same exact products

Sometimes I just want to look for stuff made by brands I want because I'm doing something somewhat professional and need the name brand to not be SHJWEHAS or I'll get made fun of relentlessly. Its the cost of being accepted and getting work sometimes. You over pay for the hammer to communicate something to the other people you're swinging it with. I don't like it, but I can't change it.

Ugh, I agree with you in general, but forks that go in mouths.... of ... kids... You don't care what those things are made of ? At all? Thats where you lose me. But I'll buy a flash light or screw driver from WE*(H(*@#!HUW#QEUGHGFSWUIHSGE for $5 delivered same day.

I mean thats the honest truth. They would just take the money. There really aren't industries that competitive where they would gain a whole lot of market share if they could charge lower interchange fees. It would make a difference on the margin for small struggling businesses. Its one of those things where they look at costs, and see the large number next to processing fees and try to figure out ways of not paying it. They're doing the same with electricity, wages, costs of products they sell, taxes, etc. Its just what companies do: Maximize revenue/profits, minimize costs.

Da fuq are you on about? What is the product I can buy or service I can get?

I mean is it news for nerds? Not really.

Is it par for the course for slashdot? Yup.

Yell at the cloud, I won't stop you.

No, No no. Silly people who think they understand things. The money is charged to the merchant, yes thats true. However, you with a rewards card get charged the same price as Joe Schmoe who does not have a rewards card. You are paying less because you get the reward. Joe Schmoe is getting screwed. So get the rewards you can so you pay lower prices.

Still trying to extort money from IBM after all this time. Nothing like a business model made up entirely of rent seeking.

Here's the thing you have to balance.

Piracy => getting near unlimited stuff for free screwing those that created it.
Non piracy => paying for limited stuff that sometimes can be taken away from you if its drm locked.

It would seem the ethical choice would be

Hybrid piracy => paying for limited stuff, but also pirating it if drm locked.

You pay for the items to keep incentivizing things you like, and you get to keep your purchases.

Frankly, the quality of build, the stability of the operating system, and just the plain reliability and features even in the supporting tools exceed Windows. Take the Preview App. The work I can do on PDFs; signatures, annotations, OCR, right out of the box, and built so that the versions on my iPhone and iPad fully integrate, cannot be easily replicated on Windows. Apple just really has an eye for workflow, and making sure the base system and tools fit well into that.

It's not perfect, to be sure, I wouldn't want to use Pages as my full time word processor, and Apple, like Microsoft and Google, suffer designed interoperation friction, which does suck. But all in all, I'm just more efficient on a Mac, and in subtle ways I never knew were even problems until I picked a MacBook up the first time. Honestly going to Windows right now is just horrible for me, particular Windows 11, which just feels like constant chaos and out of control busy-ness.

This guy gets it.

We're old here. The kids that used snap ten years ago are adults still using snap.