You’re always fighting upstream that way.

Even at a massive enterprise with a 9 figure account relationship with Microsoft, they just won’t fix issues after a few weeks of release. The product groups will rope a dope you until you hit some product cycle milestone and then tell you to fuck off.

The company has laid off or reallocated everyone and moved them to Azure. It’s Windows latest or bust. Since Apple is a shitshow with Mac and Google is too mercurial to rely on, dumpster fire is the new normal.

If you can do it, the smart money right now is to invest in iOS and watch Chrome.

I mean, the GP and most people who hear "fighting the Windows update cycle" assume you mean "fighting against being forced to interrupt your work and reboot to update" (the constant complain among Windows users) rather than something about intentionally avoiding new versions of the OS.

If you were an OS company and it were possible to force everyone to be running on master (and thereby not have any security vulnerabilities), wouldn't you, too?

But even then, this isn't true:

> It’s Windows latest or bust

Windows IoT Core is pretty stable. Wouldn't want your ATM or billboard rebooting every night. There are folks at Microsoft who remember how to do LTS software. They just don't think it's a good idea in a consumer product.

That's one perspective.

Microsoft moved to a model where addressing security updates, non-security failures and feature enhancements in rolled together into one stream of change.

You need to look at your risks systematically. If you're a billboard provider, uptime matters, and you update when risks exist that you don't have other controls for. In an individual or corporate use case, ymmv. Some people want the bleeding edge all of the time. Other people want a stable user and application experience, and apply fixes for security or functional errata only.

People ultimately make choices. From what I see, many people are doing the stuff that matters to them to the perceived stability of their phone. Schools are increasingly Chrome-focused. Enterprises are still Microsoft, but they are spending too much on Windows.

> and thereby not have any security vulnerabilities

That's not what running on master means. It means that all of your (many) security vulnerabilities are ones you don't know about[1] and random things keep breaking for no reason (and when you report them, it breaks in a way that's just different enough to let your bug report be closed as FIXED).

1: except (if you pay attention) the ones the developer advertises as 'features', like ssh with a default password of "password" baked into the kernel for "inventory management".

How can I obtain LTSC legally for reasonable price?

I think you can use it if you buy the Microsoft Action Pack, which BTW is relatively unknown, and incredible value for what you get.