OpenStars

Regexps are awesome! And also not at the same time:-P. 🎉 Congrats👏!:-)

If you’re an OG iPhone or Mac user, then you might remember paid software updates. Over a decade ago, long before iOS 16 and macOS Ventura, major Apple OS updates used to cost users around $10 for iOS and $20 for macOS. By iOS 4, though, Apple switched to free software updates, allowing users to update their devices for as long as they’re supported without having to pay a fee.

Yeah, but nowadays it’s all “free” - as in you only pay for the hardware to enter their walled garden (but then no matter how much you pay, you can never really leave! at least not via normal, legal means, if you want to ever come back - Welcome to the Hotel California 🎶…!:-P).

Although ironically, the OS software itself is free to end users, as are future upgrades.

Google also sells hardware, e.g. in its Pixel line, and there too the OS software is “free”, as are future upgrades, up to a point.

Both sell listings in their respective stores.

These concepts are getting murkier over time.

It is good to start with something other than a daily driver, so that such problems don’t hold you back as much - e.g. an older machine, or as others mentioned dual booting.