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Comment by testplzignore | Hacker News Reader

This got me thinking that I don't really know what products Microsoft even sells anymore. I know they have Windows and Office of course, but do they even still sell Windows, or is it all ad-driven revenue now? And of course they have bing.com, which is ad-driven. And Xbox, though that itself has gone through a similiar series of confusing names (Xbox 360 is Xbox 2 and Xbox One is Xbox 3?!).

I found https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Live, which has a list of various online products that have been renamed or killed off. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bing_Shopping is the most ridiculous one, which has gone through every possible name except for "MSDOS Shopping". I had no idea it even existed.

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> do they even still sell Windows, or is it all ad-driven revenue now?

Yes. I built a gaming PC last year and had to buy Windows 10 since I wasn't upgrading any existing computer. It's not cheap either—it was one of the high cost components of the system.

And Win10 now has (what many consider) ads: https://www.theverge.com/2017/3/17/14956540/microsoft-window...

You could have used a non activated version with a free image provided by MS as the only downside now is a few customization options disabled. It shows as far as MS is willing to go to put Win 10 in people throat.

They are still making a lot of money selling Windows. Every OEM has to buy a copy of Windows.

The only difference is that now they don't charge for upgrades. Which is extremely smart because the cost of supporting people on decade old OSes probably significantly exceeds the revenues earned from consumers who are buying Windows upgrades to their existing PCs.

Oh, and enterprise licenses are the same, if I am not mistaken.

Frankly, MS not making updates free earlier was them shooting themselves in their foot.

They didn't change me to upgrade to Win 10 but they stripped out the ability to play movies on DVD and then tried to sell me a $15 app.

Get VLC.

Actually, VLC is for Linux and macOS, because they don't have MPC-HC - https://mpc-hc.org/

Um Actually[1], some of us prefer VLC.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qam4iiya1q0

Get MPV or VLC. I like MPV because the minimum, no nonsense approach to just play video.

> Oh, and enterprise licenses are the same

IIRC MS enterprise licensees are charged for "software assurance", which is an annualized fee they pay for regular updates and upgrades. This looks like it's continuing with Windows 10.

On the consumer side, Microsoft would really like you to not buy a Mac. Since Mac's OS updates are free, it just makes sense that Windows is free anyway - they made very little on retail Windows sales anyway. I guess they figure they'll make their money when people upgrade laptops/desktops or buy other form-factors, e.g. 2-in-1s or tablets.

Azure is growing quickly.

AzureOneSkyLive is a much snappier name though.

Tomorrow: Bing Cloud.

Problem there is no one knows how to pronounce it. Every day I hear two people talking, and person one says “a /zh/ ure” while person two says “uh-zhure”. Emphasis on the u or emphasis on the a.

It’s almost as bad as Ker-burr-os vs Ker-bear-os or OS 10 vs OS Ex.

Anyone who can speak English knows it's just azure

That didn’t stop Linux.

Or products made from aluminium.

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