Windows 10: What You Need to Know

[vienna]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

It's a padded cell and you're in manacles. You can use any software you want as long as it's downloaded from the Microsoft Store, and that's only the beginning of the "captivity with a smile" campaign in this abortion of an operating system.

The odd thing about this argument is Apple, by severely limiting not only the software that could be used on Mac desktops/laptops, but, also the very hardware available (not under Apple license? You can't use it...), has been doing exactly this since its inception, with very little outcry about Apple being unreasonably "controlling"; imagine the outcry if Microsoft had imposed the same restrictions as Apple on PC products...

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

They are specifically going for the educational system, which has enthusiastically adopted Google Chromebooks. For Microsoft to succeed here, the schools must ditch all the hardware they've purchased in the last several years and replace it with more expensive stuff.

This would be true of any switch from any one OS/hardware platform to another. Apple, up until the last 5 or so years, was the dominant OS/hardware platform chiefly because they early on pretty much gave away or sold their product at extremely low prices to educational entities at all levels to ensure a firm hold on the market for later, higher priced sales; it was a model sort of loosely based on the stereotypical drug pusher motif: "Yeah, here, the first taste is free, but the next hit is gonna cost you..."

A few years back, the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD). a district encompassing over 960 square miles, about 735,000 students, over 26,000 teachers and a budget of about US$7.6 billion, at the urging of a senior administrator, initiated a program to give an IPad for each student in the LAUSD system. The project was a disastrous failure and cost the LAUSD staggering amounts of money, at taxpayer expense and to the enrichment of Apple. It was later discovered the senior administrator whose bright idea it was had a more than cozy relationship with Apple and was, in essence, a shill for Apple computers. The fact the administrator favored and pushed for the much more expensive Apple platform over proposed much less expensive PC-based alternative should have raised warning flags, but thus is the course of governmental procurement and bureaucracy...

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

Chromebooks account for about 60% of the educational market with Apple and Microsoft at about 20% each. Schools are all very happy within the Chrome environment. Chances of Microsoft success? Somewhere less than zero.

Here is a March 2, 2017 NY Times article on market shares in US classrooms:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/02/t...education.html

As can be seen in the article's graph, Apple has dipped slightly in share while PCs have gained slightly; Google really didn't become a factor until 2012 and didn't surpass Apple until some time in late 2013. A while back, I posted an opinion that, given the ubiquity of Android-based hardware such as cellphones, tablets, etc., Google would become the preeminent platform across all devices. Where Apple sought to gain a stranglehold on the education market by giveaways and low-balling prices, Android has the advantage of being literally the main entry level exposure to technology for newer student entering the school system; every kid either has or has access to an Android cell phone, tablet, or other device. Add to this the relatively inexpensive Android-based hardware and their availability, the ability to easily move across multiple devices, and it is no surprise Apple and MS are falling by the wayside...



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