Microsoft accidentally lists the benefits of not using a Microsoft account on Windows 11

The online requirements are unnerving to me. I feel like Microsoft wants my personal files. I don't think it's to outright steal or scam, but there is something in everyone's data they want. Maybe AI training. Anyway I'm not giving it up willingly.

Since they mentioned the workarounds but didn't explain them, I'm copying my comment from another post a couple of weeks ago.

Lemmy probably isn’t the target audience for this, here’s the steps to bypass the MS account requirement when setting up W11:

Configure your keyboard, but before you select your wifi network press Shift+(Fn)+F10 to open Command Prompt.

Type in the following command and press enter. Your computer will reboot: oobe\bypassnro

After the reboot, configure your keyboard and location settings, and click the option at the bottom of the page to say that you don’t want to connect to the internet

Click the link on the next page to “Continue with limited setup”, then follow the prompts to enter a username and password.

Garbage article. Headline interprets like Microsoft slipped or leaked something. The article discusses why the "pros" are actually "cons".

Here are the main reasons listed by Microsoft:

• A local account is created on the device and doesn't require Internet connectivity to sign in. It's independent of other services, and it's not connected to the cloud. Your settings, files, and applications are limited to that single device
• A Microsoft account, on the other hand, is associated to an email address and password that you use with Outlook.com, Hotmail, Office, OneDrive, Skype, Xbox, and Windows. When you sign in to your PC with a Microsoft account, you’re connected to a Microsoft cloud service, and your settings and files can sync across various devices. You can also use it to access other Microsoft services

It’s apparently not introducing the “benefits”.

Someone asked Copilot to come up with that text...

I frankly wouldn't care at all had MS not truncate your home folder to 5 characters when using a Ms account and also didn't make using remote desktop impossible when enabling a passwordless account.

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Using a Microsoft account lets you connect your PC to Microsoft cloud services, sync files across devices, and even sync your settings across multiple PCs.

But I believe there are users who would view Microsoft's reasons against using a local account as positives, not negatives.

I use a Microsoft account and sync just about everything across multiple PCs, but I understand that's not the preferred setup for everyone.

The support document does not list a way to set up your PC with a local account.

I wonder how many people cannot use a modern PC because they lack an internet connection for the initial setup process.

Microsoft is certainly aware that many people lack easy access to the web.

The original article contains 497 words, the summary contains 119 words. Saved 76%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

Just don't use windows. Noones forcing u to use that thing.

"as explained by Microsoft on accident"?! Call me what you will but I would think the author writing articles should know it's "by accident"

The summary is slightly misleading, you can log in offline on a computer with a MS account. In fairness, the language on the article around this is pretty confusing, but you're not locked out of your PC if your Internet is down, which is what the bullet point summary implies.