I’ve never seen this and if I did, I would just turn it off.

I've not seen this and I set up new Macs every year. Can you expand? You'd have to open the news app to see this AFAIK. Unless it was part of some iCloud on-boarding process which I haven't done in years.

I don't recall the details. Possibly may appear as an onboarding process.

I think in the same way we now see advertising on school buses and display-covered vending machines (even inside a state office), were going to end up with forms of outreach / ads in our tools unless there's more robust forms of support (could be paying, could be a more multicapital flow of support).

That only happens if the loved one opens the Apple News app, and grants permission for notifications. If they never open Apple News, or if they open it and deny permission, no notification.

Yes on iOS - but you can turn that off easily but installing News.app or removing it's notifications.

Microsoft makes it much more difficult, then wipes out your preferences a few patches later.