I agree that if Google is getting the content for free they should, at least try, to keep it ad free for the consumer. But I don’t know if Google has to pay licensing for stuff like PBS. PBS does technically have ads, but they are unobtrusive, shown at the beginning or end of a show and are presented as “Brought to you by….” Less of an ad and more recognition that a company has paid to support bringing PBS to you for free.

I’ve never uses this service, so I’m not aware of how they might insert ads either. Between shows? Typical ad-breaks times every 8.5 minutes of broadcast time? More?

Isn’t that the agreed upon consolation for free content? Was nobody alive when TV was the primary means of content consumption?

It always irked me that people are upset over YouTube running ads. Like, of course they had to start running ads, hosting/programming/daily operating millions of videos isn’t free for them. They need to make money some how, even at “break even” which prevents the idea of profit seeking would mean running ads.

Hate to sound like a “kids these days” but seriously, absolutely nothing in life is free and if there isn’t a direct cost, advertising is going to be present.

I get it, I walked into the den and poked the bear. But I think a reality check for this kind of “Linux will take over Microsoft” is necessary. 95% of computer users don’t care about their OS and would never imagine re-installing it or installing a different one. Just the idea of thinking about an OS puts that person in the advanced user category. It took Google to mod Linux and sell it to every public school in America to get it to a 4% user base. It is clearly not something for everyone, it isn’t even for most people who use Reddit or Lemmy, and those communities are def more closely representative of people capable of using Linux.

I understand that there have been many advances to make it a usable OS for the casual person. But it isn’t. Sure, your mom might be able to use it “out of the box” but it doesn’t come in a box. The two widely adopted versions of Linux had to be heavily modified by large dev teams of Valve and Google, for very limited numbers of devices. Would Valve make a version for a non-gaming focused device, or computer at large? Would Google make a version that wasn’t in direct support of Googles products? I doubt it.

It isn’t just lack of knowledge of Linux that is holding it back. Its main demographic is nerdy computer people who are willing to, occasionally, run a shell command or hunt down the necessary things to get their webcam to work. That isn’t what Microsoft aims for, they aim for the average computer user who wants to watching videos, play games, browse the web and check their emails without thinking about any part of how or why it works.

I appreciate the enthusiasm Linux fanboys have about this. But ain’t nobody but the most tech savvy would even consider it.

Linux is not consumer friendly, it typically involves putting in a shit load of effort to get working with your hardware, the ones that don’t still need a ton of work to make “Windows-like” and compatibility is always going to be an issue.

Yes, there have been a ton of strides toward this dream situation. But without financial incentive, making things user-friendly isn’t going to happen. In fact, much of the Linux community prides themselves on having a “difficult” OS.

Once Linux can, by default, have an easy to use interface, can natively run Android apps and windows applications, and can work with a huge range of hardware, it will never take off. Linux might get a few points of market share due to some business applications finding Linux a better option than updating HW and windows build, but those companies are going to struggle and will be even more dependent on their IT staff for the simplest of things.

Running Windows 11, is updated, VPN works perfectly