Microsoft, if you're listening; Ads in Windows, is what pushed me to leave. I have no intention of ever returning. Ads in the tools that I use for my work are unacceptable.
I'm pretty sure Microsoft is operating under the assumption that everyone who could quit Windows has done so already. Sadly most of the world lacks the technical knowledge (for Linux) or money (for Mac) to make a switch, and on the corporate side Windows is pretty much a mandate, so what can the end user even do?
WSL was a clear push to get developers to use Windows by giving them the best of both worlds. Similarly virtual desktops and snap layouts supposedly got a whole lot better with Windows 11, and those are clearly power user features. So some teams at Microsoft clearly care.
As usual Microsoft doesn't show a clear direction, unless that direction is infighting.
Agree, for the average end-user switching is still difficult. I do think for some of the more technically oriented ones (some gamers, etc...) it may be possible.
Gaming on Linux has long been difficult. Not going to get a lot of support from gamers there. The "I want to play games on my linux box" crowd is a lot bigger than the "I want to use linux on my gaming box" crowd.
Indeed. Why install something that will only cause problems?
However, for those who are willing to accept the problems to try something different, it's surprisingly un-bad. Majority of Steam stuff does work, via their fork of Wine; if it's not officially compatible, you can enable it anyway.
I moved my parents from win xp to ubuntu years ago... If I told them it was a new windows version, they'd belive me. Browser works, mail works, youtube works,... and they don't care about the rest.
