Ceding control: How Copilot+ and PCs could make enterprises beholden to Microsoft

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The personal computer revolutionized society by putting the power of technology directly in the hands of individuals. The openness and modularity of PCs allowed users to customize their machines, create what they wanted without restrictions and maintain control over their digital experience.​​ However, this open spirit that once defined the PC era has been gradually eroding, giving way to a new age of closed, tightly controlled computing.

In recent years, we’ve seen a steady decline of the openness that defined the PC era. It started with the shift to less upgradable laptops and mobile devices, led by Apple’s incredibly successful iPhone and MacBook lines. While these products boasted sleek designs and tight hardware-software integration, they came at the cost of user upgradeability and repair rights.

Apple’s walled-garden approach extended to software as well. The iOS App Store model, which Google soon emulated with Android, gave Apple unprecedented control over what software could run on its devices. This “curated computing” paradigm, sold as a security benefit, began acclimating users to a world where they no longer had full sovereignty over their machines.

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