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Comment by agloeregrets | Hacker News Reader

I would argue that macOS does have some advertisements , mostly for Apple services, they just tend to be cleaner and better integrated. (Also the free bit is a little fuzzy as the costs are baked into the hardware.) Microsoft is far more guilty however.

Imagine how nice Windows 10 would be if Microsoft didn't own Bing, Xbox, and Office.

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Exactly. Apple Music, Apple Maps, Apple iPhone, Apple Watch, Apple iPad, Apple iCloud, Apple Facetime, Apple TV, etc.

I'm pretty sure I see adverts for all these things on my "advert-free" Macbook.

Really where? I’ve never heard of adverts on a MacBook for their hardware at all. Only one is for iCloud and that’s if you got their 5GB limit. Other services for when launch the app for the first time and safari for when you use a browser for the first time that’s not safari.

* When I buy a new Macbook or upgrade the OS, I get a "walkthrough" of new features which tends to include integration with other Apple devices.

* Most Apple apps (e.g. Home, Messages, Photos, Maps, Podcasts, FindMy) advertise their integration with other Apple hardware.

* Only pre-installed browser is Safari, and the homepage is apple.com.

They might not be blatant, but I'd highly surprised if the marketing department isn't involved in their placement. They don't, for example, mention any competing products.

Also, there's no obvious reason Apple has to advertise the Apple Music subscription when I open the app to play my own MP3s.

Also if you've ever hit play/pause on the keyboard it launches Apple Music.

And not macOS, but in iOS they've had a giant row offering an Apple Arcade subscription trial at the top of Settings for a while

>Imagine how nice Windows 10 would be if Microsoft didn't own Bing, Xbox, and Office.

Maybe I'm cynical, but if MS is adding ads to the OS that you paid for, then how much worse would it be if they didn't have these other platforms raising money to offset as well. I'm imagining your OS with a desktop that looks like a NASCAR car and driver's suit.

Trust me, out of the box it already looks that way.

> Also the free bit is a little fuzzy as the costs are baked into the hardware.

For well over a decade that didn't make OS X free. I 'member when upgrading OS X meant forking $129.

Given how much Microsoft has monetized Windows these days, they could probably give it away free and still make money.

My laptop come with Windows 7. I never pay for Windows 10. And I still get free update in last 5 years.

At this point they pretty much do. You can download an ISO of Windows 10 Pro, install it and never pay or register it and it will work fine indefinitely with no real restrictions. Last time I tried it, it just prevented setting the background image.

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