No, you buy a certificate of ownership. That’s what NFT is.

Can I start with Gentoo or is that too easy?

I would say that security and privacy are also very important. That’s something you can’t get with Windows.

Congratulations! Next you might want to learn about the Free Software movement: https://youtu.be/Ag1AKIl_2GM

So, yeah, sell me on Linux, please.

Windows has spyware, so that should be enough reason to not use it for someone like you. You will have to spend some time to learn GNU/Linux, but for most office tasks it shouldn’t be difficult, especially if you are good with computers. Most popular distros already come with a PDF viewer and Libre Office, so it should be able to do almost everything you want out of the box. VLC player can play all common video types and is easy to install. Libre Office might have issues with some Word documents though, so you might need to look into that. A web browser (usually Firefox) and probably some email client will be preinstalled as well.

You might need to check if your printer and scanner will be supported out of the box or if extra drivers from the manufacturer are needed (then check if they are available on their website). I think printers will probably work fine out of the box, but scanners might require extra drivers (this depends on the model - there are models that don’t).

If you need more motivation, look into the Free Software movement: https://youtu.be/Ag1AKIl_2GM

GNOME also has an app that lets you do encrypted incremental backups very easily.

I agree, but movie DVDs and Blu-Rays contain DRM. It’s probably easy to break it (which is illegal btw) and get regular files out of it, but the practice of adding DRM is unethical and we shouldn’t reward companies that do it with our money. It’s also possible to record your screen when watching a movie on Netflix (at least when using GNU/Linux), so you would get a copy of that movie, but we need to have higher standards.

I think if anything contains DRM, you should either not use it or pirate it instead.

I see, that makes sense. But I also think that every content that you have paid to access should be DRM-free, so even in a streaming service.

Wow, you are right! I was confused about iTunes, because it seems to require an app, but it is DRM-free and so is Amazon Music. That’s great! So I guess only Spotify has DRM.

You don’t have to use physical media. You can buy digital DRM-free music and games online and store them on your hard drive like many people do. I was only using music CDs as an example, since they don’t contain DRM.

I don’t own the copyright, but I can use it offline with any software I want on any device whenever I want. I can lend the physical disk to a friend and if I don’t like it or get bored with it, I can sell it. That’s what you can do with music CDs and you used to be able to do with PC games before they contained Steam’s DRM.

That’s not how big tech works, it’s how DRM works. It is possible to sell music/games/movies in an ethical way, without DRM.

The recommendations will likely become worse over time, because they want you to listen to whatever makes them the most money and that might not be the same stuff you want to listen to. The same happened to tiktok recommendations and youtube subscriptions (people stopped getting notifications on creators they subscribed to).

Bandcamp is DRM-free, so whatever you buy there, you truly own it. Unlike on most other platforms.

If you don’t own the music/games/movies you pay for, you are always the product.

Windows X11

They did improve the design for sure. Also the features. It only took them 15 years to implement tabs in Windows Explorer and over 20 years to include a package manager.

You can have multiple operating systems installed and choose which one you want to use during boot. So just install GNU/Linux on a separate partition or a separate drive (a bit easier). Then try to use GNU/Linux as your main system. Install everything you need on it and configure it they want you want. Only switch to Windows when you absolutely have to. So you don’t have to be a GNU/Linux expert right away and you can choose when to remove Windows. It can be a gradual change.

I don’t know any good videos for beginners, but you can just look up answers to specific problems when you need them. If you will still have Windows, there is nothing to worry about. You can always ask for help here as well. So don’t wait and install GNU/Linux today! Choose the distribution you want to use, find a video on how to install it and start using it.

Here is a link to a video explaining the Free Software movement if you are curious why this operating system was created https://youtu.be/Ag1AKIl_2GM. Maybe it will motivate you.

Software is usually installed from repositories and not random websites, so there is less room for user error in general. Even if you download an executable file, you will most likely have to give it permissions to run first. So I think it’s more immune to viruses not because of its users, but because of the way it’s designed.

It’s certainly better to use WINE to run a few proprietary programs than to run a whole proprietary operating system like Windows :)