Microsoft brings extra advertisements to the Home windows 11 Begin Menu, harassing native account customers

A scorching potato: It is no secret that Microsoft actually, actually desires folks to make use of Home windows 11. What’s one of the best ways to realize this objective? Judging by the newest dev construct, extra Begin Menu advertisements that harass individuals who do not sign up with an official Microsoft account.

Stories arrived in November of Microsoft testing advertisements, or “notifications,” in a Home windows 11 Preview Construct’s Begin Menu; Microsoft merchandise appeared within the flyout display screen above the Change Account Settings. One of many advertisements prompted customers to again their information as much as OneDrive, whereas one other suggests customers join a Microsoft Account.

Information of the advertisements introduced loads of justified anger, however not sufficient to make Microsoft rethink its plans. The Redmond firm began sending them out to a couple customers in March’s KB5023778 Preview Construct and expanded the apply in final week’s Home windows 11 Insider Preview Construct 23435.

The 4 advertisements/notifications are targeted on encouraging those that log in with a neighborhood account to join an official Microsoft account. They extol the advantages of having the ability to again up a tool, use Microsoft 365, hold safety and profile settings in a single place, and obtain 5GB of free cloud storage for accessing information on the transfer.

Not surprisingly, Microsoft persevering with to drive these advertisements on folks has been met with virtually common condemnation. “That is what a monopoly is like including in issues to trick and inconvenience you,” wrote one Reddit person (through The Reg). “Whoops I simply pushed an replace that units your browser to Edge, have advertisements as notifications and Groups and OneDrive unable to be faraway from the system.”

Not everybody has been crucial of the advertisements. One particular person famous that they’d somewhat put up with these notifications than see Home windows flip right into a subscription mannequin. Others have identified that ads for OneDrive appeared in Home windows 8 and 10, so this is not something new on Microsoft’s half – not that it makes it okay.

Not all options that seem in preview builds find yourself within the full launch, however Microsoft is de facto pushing these advertisements laborious and has been for months now, so it appears we’ll most likely be getting them quickly, whether or not folks prefer it or not.

In different Home windows 11 information, we have heard this month that Microsoft might change the Print Display screen key’s perform to open the snipping instrument within the OS. The corporate can be fascinated about letting customers force-close apps from the taskbar, and is testing an Edge characteristic that provides a second taskbar to the desktop (Home windows 11 and 10).