You can put some work into windows to slim it down some, a unattended generator to turn most of the crap off on install, then Shutup OO goes a long way

> You can put some work into windows

That's exactly my point.

There's an ever growing list of things to do in order to fix Windows, and that list is likely longer than Linux. This whole "your time is free" argument hinges on Windows not having exactly the same issue, or worse.