They make it very difficult to uninstall that crap. I set up a new windows 11 machine the other day. And then did the obligatory removal of the weather/news, cortana, and 15 other pieces of crap I don’t need or want. While I was doing that it was downloading updates and once the updates were installed, the weather/news thing was back.

The stories on there are so bad. Like, borderline conspiracy thinking / conservative media gossip rag stuff. I can’t believe Microsoft puts their company name behind the content that shows up. (Though I’m in Australia. Maybe the people in charge of that content have no idea how bad it is here).

I'm in Australia too, and just assumed that stuff was the norm for the US.

It's the norm in certain subcultures in the US, but it would be incorrect to say it's the norm in the US as a whole.

Defaults are incredibly powerful. For us on here, we expect to have control and to be able to manipulate these things. For most people a computer is just an appliance like a washing machine. Accept it as it comes!

While I appreciate the ability to configure software, I also believe that software that requires too much configuration is poorly suited for my needs and will replace it with something better suited to my needs. There is an incredible number of options out there. We do not have to put up with the nonsense that overbearing businesses subject us to.

> There is an incredible number of options out there. We do not have to put up with the nonsense that overbearing businesses subject us to.

How true that is depends on the type of software. Web browsers, for instance, don't have an incredible number of meaningfully different options. I can no longer find one that sufficiently meets my needs at all.

> With remote work it always fascinates me to see how many people leave the weather (& news) bar displayed next to the tray on the taskbar

I leave it there and I've been a SWE for over 20 years.

I just like seeing what the temperture is at the moment. So I know how to dress if I was dare to go outside.

The news being part of it though, on HOVER, is a nightmare. They need to stop that ASAP.

Just have to right click the task bar and change the news settings to 'reduce updates' & turn off open on hover.

Turning on 'reduce updates' just has the taskbar display the weather and not change to some random stock ticker of a company you don't care about or whatever other item of interest they feel like showing.

Those widgets randomly come back after updates for me, along with ads in the start menu, even if you spent time removing them.

"People really don't change defaults..."

Because they are scared of breaking things.

Also, most people actually do change defaults: style and theme.

they don’t

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/dec/01/default-s...

https://www.propublica.org/article/set-it-and-forget-it-how-...

Your links talk only about technical standards. But have you ever looked at a normal persons phone/desktop?

They are usually quite colorful and this is not the standard.

> I was wondering if I could make a fake one, just add an appropriate icon and change its label to say something like 6000°C Nuclear Holocaust

Dude, if you ever make this, post it to HN. I'd install that on my computer in a heartbeat.

And this is why windows is plagued with malware.

not really. people on HN making joke software (that is probably open source) doesn't sound like a particularly common source of malware