I don't think it is the first time they do this, at least on one occasion, they have shown an ad for Tomb Raider on the lock screen.

And I am evidently an minority here, but I don't really mind. I don't really have a problem with ads, I have a problem with annoying ads. Popups, banners, billboards, notifications, video segments, etc... they grab your attention and take up valuable space, I hate these, and I think everyone else does.

But here it is just a wallpaper that happens to be branded, it is not particularly distracting, in fact, I find it pretty good overall. I like this simple, low contrast style for a wallpaper on the background.

And that Tomb Raider lockscreen image from before was more than good, to me, it was one of the best!

Of course, you may have different tastes, but and I can easily imagine someone being unaware that it is an ad (or not caring) and making it his new default.

I understand why people wouldn't want this, but I didn't expect that much outrage. I mean, it is Windows 11, and you are letting Microsoft pick wallpapers for you, what did you expect? Getting to see the wallpaper behind all these much more intrusive ads, notifications and AI crap seems like a rather impressive feat. So much that I would have expected people who got there to have given up on complaining, or better, given up on Windows. And the author runs an "insider preview", talk about masochism!

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mapontosevenths a day ago | parent | next [-]

> don't really have a problem with ads,

I paid for windows. I am the customer. I am not not the product.

I actually like Windows, or did for most of my nearly 30 year career. In the past I have defended it against the "winblows" crowd.

Now there are no new features that users want, the start menu is a progressive web app, explorer takes 2x3 times the resources it did in 10 and does less, and they have lost all respect for me as a consumer.

I'm one ad away from migrating everything I own to a system that respects me. It will be an investment, but I suspect it will be worth it.

The new macs look nice.

	▲	jareklupinski a day ago \| parent [-]
		> The new macs look nice theyre a nice stepstone but after a couple years on a macbook im looking at just using my fedora desktop fulltime

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matherial a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

If I showed up at your place and painted some tactful ads on the walls, would you have an issue with it?

Or, if you bought a mattress and discovered that it hums some well-targeted, inoffensive jingle at 11pm every night, would that be fine?

Ads intruding deeper and deeper into your "personal" space are an issue even if they're executed well. Now, for free products, maybe that's fine. But you paid for that OS, and now it comes with ads on multiple surfaces.

	▲	GuB-42 a day ago \| parent [-]
		> If I showed up at your place and painted some tactful ads on the walls, would you have an issue with it? Yes, because I didn't call you to paint anything on my walls. But if I hired you to paint me something on my wall every month, and gave you total freedom, then no, I wouldn't mind an occasional tactful ad. In fact, I know some people who buy (or steal) ad posters they find beautiful and put them on their wall. > Or, if you bought a mattress and discovered that it hums some well-targeted, inoffensive jingle at 11pm every night, would that be fine? No, I don't want my mattress to hum, mattresses are not supposed to hum. But if I bought a picture frame and that picture frame came preloaded with a tasteful ad, then I would be fine, because picture frames are supposed to have pictures in it. I can always change it later. That's what I wanted to point out. That ad is a picture that goes where pictures should go, and blends in. It is not like an ad banner that goes where content should be, a billboard that block my view of the landscape, or that humming that definitely shouldn't come out of a mattress. > But you paid for that OS That component, Bing Wallpaper is free, I think. And I believe you can have it on other OSes. Bundling ad-supported software and services in paid software is still a dubious practice, but in this particular case, I don't think it is that bad, as in, pretty much everything else is worse in Windows.

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15kingben a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Subjectively I like the artwork, and I'm used to way worse ads on Windows like Bing popups when I open Chrome. In fact, that this extension has been delivering genuinely pleasant landscapes, cityscapes, animal photos etc. for many years now makes it so frustrating and jarring to get ads here too. I uninstalled it, but I doubt they care, since if they can't serve me ads how else would they extract value from me using the product.

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bluefirebrand a day ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> I don't really have a problem with ads, I have a problem with annoying ads

I'm of the opinion that basically all ads are annoying.

Anything that wants to take my attention away from the thing I actually want to do feels very hostile to me

	▲	mapontosevenths a day ago \| parent [-]
		I'll go further. Advertising is at it's very core an abuse. They took Aristotles rhetoric, and turned it into a slimy dead thing that seeks profit rather than truth. Advertising is sophistry, and sophistry is evil.

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dfxm12 a day ago | parent | prev [-]

I don't mind dumb ads (no tracking, etc), but it comes down to enshittification. Microsoft is making money at our expense.