News No, Notepad for Windows 11 doesn't require you to use a Microsoft account — unless you're trying to use AI

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I don't trust a single Microsoft "App" in Windows 11. I even use the old Windows Photo Viewer program that you can still enable with a registry edit. I still download the stand alone 7zip program to use to decompress all zip, rar, 7z files. VLC or MPV for videos.
 
Admin said:
So, despite many valid arguments against Microsoft's generative AI push in Windows and Microsoft needlessly bloating its operating systems, the controversy in this particular case seems overblown.
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Microsoft has dug its own hole here, that should be recognized. They have a terrible track record of being abusive to their own customers, and so even if this information is flat false or "overblown" as stated, the fact remains:

It's believable. I said this same thing with the very first (or the very first that I saw) report on Tom's of RTX 5090's having melting cables. In the outset, the biggest problem Nvidia had was that melting cables was believable whether or not that very first one was a fluke, and the same is so here for Microsoft.

Because Microsoft is abusive and they have been now for what seems like forever, because they have created this dark aura of believe-ability around every time someone discovers something that on the surface seems nefarious, Microsoft and Microsoft alone is the creator of its own jail of "guilty until proven innocent".
 
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Still don't see why people pitch a fit about having a Microsoft account when they don't about having a Google or Apple account for their phones, Amazon or Roku or innumerable accounts for their TV and entertainment, an account to buy things online, an account to use a restaurant app...

Or even an account to post in these forums.
 
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Well, I really don't like the concept of an AI tool reading all the text in an open file I am writing. No obvious way for the user to know that that data is staying completely local. Also don't know if those same capabilities grant it access to additional text inputs from other software, all depends on how it is coded and how other applications are coded and store information.

Not a fan of Grammarly either. And I generally don't like predictive text on phones, though that is more that it often corrects things that don't need to be than any privacy concern.

Then again, I have no idea if the open source software running in Linux isn't doing such things either.

I just have less trust in an organization that basically mines all the data possible from its users.
 
That "rewrite" button is an ad for Microsoft. Clicking on it prompts you to buy a feature/service, with your payment being tendered in the form of highly valuable and easily-sellable personal data.

The most basic built-in notepad program should not have ads. It should be an included feature.

What are you even getting when you are buying into Windows? They theoretically charge $140 for Windows 11. What is that price actually supposed to be buying, now that even the most basic features are ad supported?
 
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Alvar Miles Udell said:
Still don't see why people pitch a fit about having a Microsoft account when they don't about having a Google or Apple account for their phones, Amazon or Roku or innumerable accounts for their TV and entertainment, an account to buy things online, an account to use a restaurant app...

Or even an account to post in these forums.
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Maybe they fundamentally disagree that Microsoft should have complete ownership rights over the hardware they bought and, and possibly assembled. Or maybe they don't trust that their hardware should be owned by Microsoft as an always-online ad-heavy cloud-based software-as-a-service.

Or maybe people actually are complaining about our nightmare do-evil tech dystopia, but Google is just burying the complaints about the problems that they caused in this world they created.
As bad, ugly, slow, disorganized, and ad-foreword as Windows 11 is, the problems exist because they decided to just rip off the design of Chrome OS, wholesale. The clipped corners, new start menu, notification tray, centered icons, scroll bars, burdensome animations, blatant shilling for the company's other products - it's all just a cheap imitation of Google's UI, further kneecapped by the bloat of Windows.
But Microsoft doesn't understand that the reason they lost a ton of market share to Google had nothing to do with the user experience, and everything to do with schools having the sudden need to buy 40 million complete, kid-friendly, and web-only systems at 80 bucks a pop.
I can deal with Google's lousy design language when it's running surprisingly well on a so-cheap-it-feels-wrong toy. I can't deal with it when Microsoft's clone is bogging down doing real work on a $2.5k production machine.

Here-Have-Some-More-Hyphens.
 
Notepad omg, is still a thing. What a piece of trash waste of code.

For dog's sake why don't they let Notepad++ become the defacto default editor. Do a deal with the NP++ devs.
 
Alvar Miles Udell said:
Still don't see why people pitch a fit about having a Microsoft account when they don't about having a Google or Apple account for their phones, Amazon or Roku or innumerable accounts for their TV and entertainment, an account to buy things online, an account to use a restaurant app...

Or even an account to post in these forums.
Click to expand...

I don't use iCloud for backups since it's not secure. I don't save photos or videos to iCloud. I use host file blocking for my Roku. I don't enable the Windows spell checker because I don't every word I type sent to a Microsoft server just to be dragged into court if I get divorce or arrest for some crime. I don't want a data breach to give my all of my Copilot AI data to China.

An operating system is not mean to be spyware or adware.
 
My big concern with companies like Microsoft is them making all of these "Features" mandatory in an upcoming patch. Microsoft does not say, "It will never be mandatory".
 
Alvar Miles Udell said:
Still don't see why people pitch a fit about having a Microsoft account when they don't about having a Google or Apple account for their phones, Amazon or Roku or innumerable accounts for their TV and entertainment, an account to buy things online, an account to use a restaurant app...

Or even an account to post in these forums.
Click to expand...

It's a deceptive question so there is no answer to it.

Windows has been around for over 30 years and has never required such an online account.
 
Is everybody already forgetting the great UWP app disaster of 2024? After a Windowsupdate, all UWP apps failed to launch unless you were signed into the app store, including photos, calculator, onenote, mail, calendar, people, and DVD player (apparently the built-in administrator account doesn't log into the store automatically either). Microsoft fixed it a month later in the next update tuesday

It probably wasn't deliberate in trying to "encourage" people to always login with a Microsoft account, but more that developers didn't consider that anyone might ever want to use a local account even though that was technically still allowed, so never tested it.

Of course they have been busily replacing tiny Win32 programs with slow and bloated UWP apps for years. Imagine if Windows Explorer had been replaced by a UWP app and everybody booted their Windows PC to a blank desktop a year ago
 
ezst036 said:
It's a deceptive question so there is no answer to it.

Windows has been around for over 30 years and has never required such an online account.
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Video games were around for decades as well without so much but a CD key being required, but now having to have an account and online access for even single player games is the norm.

It's not a deceptive question because Windows is just following in the footsteps of everything else, and people seem to be happy to have accounts to use everything else except for Windows itself, including half a dozen game platforms to play their games they don't own on.
 
umeng2002_2 said:
I don't trust a single Microsoft "App" in Windows 11. I even use the old Windows Photo Viewer program that you can still enable with a registry edit. I still download the stand alone 7zip program to use to decompress all zip, rar, 7z files. VLC or MPV for videos.
Click to expand...
I don't even trust Microsoft itself anymore. Ive made moves, including buying additional hardware - a 2nd computer, to start the transition to linux.

I am not putting up with microsoft any longer. Ive used it for the last 30 years but come October of this year i am gone. Their own fault.

Linux, brought to you by Microsoft ™

What did it was this:

The sly covert spying that was built in to the OS that users figured out. It was then coined "telemetry".

The now overt, shameless, spying that is built in and the overt, shameless, asking if they can track you and serve you ads. This is before you have even stepped one single foot into the OS since what i am talking about takes place during the install of the OS itself.

Then there is a the matter of the use of dark patterns itself during the OS install. The confirmation shaming and misdirection efforts to get you to agree to have a microsoft account so they can truly spy on every single move you make. Including keystrokes.

Then after OS install you have to go through the settings with a fine tooth comb and turn off all sorts of settings or you get bombarded with ads from them. Bull ox to that.

And this is before O and O Shutup goes to work on the registry.

The naggin. The constant nagging. Nagging to see if you really did want firefox to be the default browser.

Yes, did you dumb chunks not just see me set firefox as default? Why are you asking me?

They are also now trying to gaslight you into thinking that Edge is baked into the OS and can cause problems if you remove it. At first you could not even remove it. Now you can and the world is still turning on its axis.

And now we have Co-pilot and Recall. Co pilot is here. Recall is here.

Recall was going to be made mandatory. They were made to back down

No way was i going to accept Recall. My own computer taking screen shots every 15 seconds and sending that into the nether? For real?

On the basis that i am too stupid to remember where i put things? IS this really the thing that will fool people into accepting totally being spied upon?

Microsoft can take a hike.

I played Skyrim and the modern Tomb Raiders on Linux yesterday. I dont need MS to play games.

I dont need them to spy on me any more either.

Funny thing is this. I am not alone in thinking any of the above either.
 
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Sluggotg said:
My big concern with companies like Microsoft is them making all of these "Features" mandatory in an upcoming patch. Microsoft does not say, "It will never be mandatory".
Click to expand...
They have to condition the user to accept the features to begin with. This is where we are now.

Copilot and Recall are here. Opt-in. For now. The tables will turn and these apps will be made mandatory. Mark my words. As soon as they have conditioned the average windows to accept its addition to the "os" then will turn it on.

What is funny about MS is this.

They scan for spyware and flag the means to evade being tracked and spied upon, as a hosts file hijacking.

They should flag themselves at this point as an OS hijacker and purveyor of spyware.

My hosts file is huge.
 
I'm I'm not so much worried about logging on for AI as I am feeling sorry for people who are still using notepad, rather than notepad plus plus or similar
 
dbareis said:
I'm I'm not so much worried about logging on for AI as I am feeling sorry for people who are still using notepad, rather than notepad plus plus or similar
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Is there any benefit to using N++ to hold a snippet of text as opposed to the old notepad?

AFAIK they both hold a bit of text.

I use notepad still on a daily basis. Am i bothered that it is not "hip"? No
 
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