Satya Nadella really nosedived Windows.
From my earlier comment to another Windows post:
Windows 11 has transitioned from a standalone tool into a digital storefront that prioritizes recurring revenue through aggressive prompts for Microsoft 365 and OneDrive subscriptions. By mandating cloud-based Microsoft Accounts, the OS effectively anchors your identity to a marketing ID, allowing the company to track behavior and monetize your data. The interface now functions as an advertising platform, injecting "recommended" apps and sponsored content directly into the Start menu and search results. Ultimately, this shift means users are no longer just customers of a product, but recurring assets whose attention and telemetry are sold to sustain Microsoft’s ecosystem and maximize shareholder value.
Windows is what it is because it's really not important to Microsoft to anymore. It's effectively unmoored from the rest of organization and left to fight for some kind of financial relevance in an organization that doesn't care about it anymore.
This isn't specifically or even unique to Microsoft. In fact, it perfectly explains Windows because this pattern has been repeated so often by so many other companies.
Personally, I think Microsoft's strategy when it comes to Windows is a mistake. There are so many companies that would kill to own a platform (see Meta) and Microsoft has this dominate platform. It's Windows that, I believe, is responsible for their cloud success. It also makes decent revenue. But they have a cloud CEO and they have cloud success and desktop operating systems are out of fashion.