Europe is slowly ditching Microsoft: why it's happening & why it could fail.
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They try this every 5 years or so. Microsoft gives them some short term discounts and they come running back back.
It's different this time around.
The previous attempts were about freeing themselves from an abusive unprincipled data-hungry big data monopoly,
This attempt is about freeing themselves from an abusive unprincipled data-hungry big data monopoly operating in a fascist country and in cahoots with the regime.
I reckon it's serious this time.
People are serious, I've never seen so many new users in the Linux groups I'm in
That might not be so much down to how serious people are but rather just how good Linux has gotten lately (especially for games). Although I do think people are more serious now.
Speaking personally, it's just as much about Windows getting worse as it is about Linux getting better.
In any complex system or "wicked problem" involving positive and negative feedback cycles, a combination of factors that push into the same direction can cause the system to flip over - sometimes in dramatic ways.
Life long windows user. I switched to Arch a few months ago and I'm not looking back. Will only be using windows in a sandboxed VM if absolutely necessary. Which, I haven't needed to yet.
Life long windows user. I switched to Arch
Fuck. That's like going straight from English breakfast tea to hash oil.
I've been using Linux almost exclusively both in my personal and professional life for a decade and a half. I only installed Arch a month or two ago.
Installing Arch might be a hassle, I tried it once and couldn’t figure it out so a kept on using Ubuntu and its derivatives. But when I got a Steam Deck I found Steam OS to be easy and the Arch documentation to be thorough and useful.
Endeavour OS is really good
I mean, considering how many bluescreens Windows is giving these days, you'll probably have a more stable experience in Arch lol.
Linux Mint?
Endeavour OS
9 out of 10 dentists recommend it!
Hell, I'm in Silicon Valley here in California, and some of my friends are also jumping off the proprietary ship because those large firms are willing to work hand in hand with federal agencies.
If you've read the NSA document disclosures by Edward Snowden, it's apparent that there is an open door for data requests. The current administration isn't a huge fan of California's diversity, so we might as well minimize our chances of being targetted...
Other countries like that and Europe deals with are: Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Russia and of course, China.
The digital dependence on the US is much like the energy dependence on Russia.
Europe is ditching Russian energy. They may ditch US tech.
God I hope so because I would love to move to Europe as a skilled developer.
I don't know about the whole Europe but Spain is buying more energy from Russia than before the war and sanctions.
Don't get me wrong, I hope that would be the case but Europe is also Corporativist.
capitalist*
thats how its called.
The European Union regulates the market so much it's hard to call it capitalism, the biggest european companies are basically EU projects like Airbus (every government funds it) or too big too fail like Siemens and/or they would use: "strategic industry" and be done with it.
Edit oh and I almost forgot it, or they are like Inditex, basically not European it's just an European getting rich while exploiting poor people all around the world, but I think this is actually capitalism and that guy isn't exactly appreciated by ruling dictator, I mean party, in Spain.
deregulation is not the same thing as capitalism.
Is it more? I know Spain is still buying some LNG from Russia, but i would have thought the amount went down, not up.
As they article points out it's all maskerading by the fact that they heavily increased the import in 2023 and now is "reduced"
Thank you for the article. It brought up something quite interesting that i wasn't aware off before:
But why does Spain rely so heavily on Russia despite the almost global disapproval? The answer lies in this country’s extensive regasification capacity, which stands at 67.1 bcm - the largest in all of Europe. This enables Spain to receive LNG shipments on behalf of other countries that lack the necessary infrastructure, making it a critical hub for European energy trade.
looking a bit into it i found this article:
https://rbac.com/spains-role-as-a-natural-gas-importer-and-re-exporter/
So it seems that Spain is also taking the flak here for other EU countries that want to profit from Russian gas but not be directly associated with it.
The European Union hypocrisy is lovely, isn't it?
Is there another link on that? The editor behind that page is a little... "undocumented" (there's almost nothing about it).
Sure but they are in Spanish. Murcia today is for the local brit community.
https://www.elmundo.es/economia/2023/12/01/656a15ffe4d4d8dc568b45bc.html
The same stuff over 200% increase in 2023 so others can say we dont buy stuff to Russia we buy it to Spain (who bought it to Russia). This source even points out the liquid gas that arrived by boat from Russia wasn't sanctioned.
As we say in Spain "hecha la ley, hecha la trampa"
Says it decrease 25%, but it's 25% from that almost 200% in 2023.
And now "La Sinrazón"🤦
You do know Marhuenda was the press chief of Rajoy, don't you?
Attacking the source instead of disproving the article.
You have hands, you can sources of your favorite side of the political spectrum, or ask an LLM.
But here are morejust because it's Saturday and I like the apple I am eating for breakfast and I am trying to make lemmy a better place than reddit: https://www.20minutos.es/noticia/5168224/0/espana-pais-ue-que-mas-gas-natural-compra-ahora-rusia/
https://theobjective.com/economia/energia/2025-02-18/espana-compra-gas-rusia-guerra-ucrania/
[Some*] Europeans just can’t get over their Arab and Muslim-hate despite neither Qatar nor Saudi Arabia posing any threat to Europe and actually being good trading partners. No tariffs, no restrictions, no unfair competition. They adopt many European standards and are a huge market for European goods and services. Yet still the hate is constantly being peddled.
hopefully a minority but the hate seems to be universal regardless of the political leaning.
You must have forgotten about why people were so mad at qatar in particular a while back. Remember how many workers died building the stadiums there for the world cup? If you're american i can understand you weren't aware of it since european football isn't exactly popular in america, but it was a huge deal over here with people protesting.
Are they democracies? No. Do they respect human rights? Also no.
I don't care as much about them as I care about pointing out the hypocrisy of my people. I have a thing against islam but that has nothing to do with this conversation.
I'm putting my money on the EU becoming just as openly Fascistic as the US and sticking with Microsoft.
People are downvoting you, but they're too scared to actually argue against it. I'm obviously hoping this isn't the case, but you'd be sticking your head in the sand if you said there was no chance of it happening.
We're already seeing a massive surge of the far right in Europe. Giant media blitzes on social media such as Twitter shoving far right content in their faces.
The Fallout:London timeline was not on my bingo card, not gonna lie. We're speedrunning Fallout politically here in the US, though.
While the former seems to be the obvious trend and Europe has historically leaned towards it. I don’t see how one results in the other. Whether they stick with Microsoft or not is more economical than political.
I wouldn't be so sure this time around.
The world is a big uncertainly and the force in Europe for digital sovereignty is something I never seen before.
The initiative to protect Europes boarders and data information is justified.
Did you see the NATO conference? The EU is grovelling for the US. If Microsoft tells them to jump they will say how high
Talk is cheap. They may say anything to buy time as they make deals between the EU, Canada, and Japan that exclude the US.
Have you considered that the EU might have lied to Trump?
Have you considered that the EU might have lied to you? https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/us-defence-firms-chase-european-military-spending-wave-2025-06-18
They didn't just give them a discount, and it was only a very small part of Europe you are talking about. It was Munich, and MS also moved a lot of workplaces to the city, to bribe it...
Yeah, I remember reading headlines like this in Linux websites back in 2014..