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Trump is driving European governments to Microsoft alternatives: What Germany, France, Denmark, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Austria are planning.

With Ukraine's cold position, rapprochement with Russia, and its tariff policy, US President Donald Trump has startled the Europeans – and fueled the discussion about digital sovereignty. The risks of dependence on American tech companies have suddenly moved up on the political agenda, not only in Berlin, but also in other European capitals.

The discussion has many facets, because US companies such as Microsoft, AWS, Google, Oracle, Broadcom and OpenAI dominate in numerous areas of IT, from hardware to cloud services to operating systems and (AI) applications. In some segments, however, Chinese suppliers such as Lenovo and Huawei also have a strong position, just like the Europeans themselves, for example with ASML or SAP.

An IT world without dependencies on third parties would not be conducive to productivity and prosperity and anyway unrealistic, after all, there is hardly any know-how for the increasingly complex products in hardly any company. But the dependence on Microsoft's software and cloud services is particularly concerned about many European politicians. If the company is forced to shut down cloud services like 365 due to orders from the US government, the impact would be drastic: ministries and agencies with 365 subscriptions could not even chat or email from now on.

If Microsoft no longer provide security updates, sooner or later all users of Windows and the "On-Premise" (i.e. on customer hardware instead of the cloud) ongoing variants of Office and Exchange got into trouble. Microsoft's plan to offer Offices only in the cloud in the future puts additional pressure on Europeans. And the switch to other providers is complicated, among other things, by the fact that management applications such as e-file programs are interwoven with Microsoft Office.

Archive : https://archive.ph/2025.04.30-111200/https://www.heise.de/hintergrund/Wie-europaeische-Staaten-ihre-Abhaengigkeit-von-Microsoft-reduzieren-wollen-10365345.html

The countdown has begun. On 14 October 2025, Microsoft will end support for Windows 10. This will leave millions of users and organisations with a difficult choice: should they upgrade to Windows 11, or completely rethink their work environment?

The good news? You don’t have to follow Microsoft’s upgrade path. There is a better option that puts control back in the hands of users, institutions, and public bodies: Linux and LibreOffice. Together, these two programmes offer a powerful, privacy-friendly and future-proof alternative to the Windows + Microsoft 365 ecosystem.

The move to Windows 11 isn’t just about security updates. It increases dependence on Microsoft through aggressive cloud integration, forcing users to adopt Microsoft accounts and services. It also leads to higher costs due to subscription and licensing models, and reduces control over how your computer works and how your data is managed. Furthermore, new hardware requirements will render millions of perfectly good PCs obsolete.

This is a turning point. It is not just a milestone in a product’s life cycle. It is a crossroads.

From next month, Danish Digital Minister Caroline Stage plans to phase out the use of Microsoft and its programs.

Over the summer, half of the ministry’s staff will switch from Windows to another operating system, Libre Office. Caroline Stage aims to lead by example and test this transition herself.

The goal is for the ministry to be completely free of Microsoft by autumn. If the transition proves too complicated, they will revert temporarily.

This initiative is part of a broader strategy called “digital sovereignty,” aiming to reduce Denmark’s dependence on US-based tech giants.

Recent global events and debate around data protection have intensified calls for digital independence. Political parties, including Enhedslisten and Alternativet, support reducing reliance on American technology companies.

An automated script to set-up Ubuntu as it should be. Tested on Ubuntu 22.04, 23.04, 24.04 and 25.04.

Features :

• Removes snaps completely
• Installs a vanilla gnome session
• Sets up flathub and gnome-software with the flatpak plugin
• Installs gnome-tweaks
• Installs Extension Manager
• Disables the Ubuntu theming
• Enables the libadwaita theme in gtk3 apps using adw-gtk3.
• Installs the MoreWaita icon theme for extended icon support.
• Enables Gnome integration with QT apps
• Installs Firefox from the Mozilla Repository
• Disables the data reporting component
• Disables the annoying crash popup Removes terminal ads

TL;DR, you will end up with a clean GNOME desktop with flatpaks, similar to a fresh Fedora install.

https://github.com/polkaulfield/ubuntu-debullshit

I’ve been a freelance journalist for 10 years, usually writing for magazines and websites about cinema. I presented a morning show on Radio Kraków twice a week for about two years. It was only one part of my work, but I really enjoyed it. It was about culture and cinema, and featured a range of people, from artists to activists. I remember interviewing Ukrainians about the Russian invasion for the first programme I presented, back in 2022.

I was let go in August 2024, alongside a dozen co-workers who were also part-time. We were told the radio station was having financial problems. I was relatively OK with it, as I had other income streams. But a few months later I heard that Radio Kraków was launching programmes hosted by three AI characters. Each had AI-generated photographs, a biography and a specific personality. They called it an “experiment” aimed at younger audiences.

Brazilian prosecutors are suing Chinese electric vehicle (EV) giant BYD and two of its contractors, saying they were responsible for human trafficking and conditions "analogous to slavery" at a factory construction site in the country.

BYD did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the BBC but has previously said it has "zero tolerance for violations of human rights and labour laws."

Authorities halted construction of the plant late last year after workers were found living in cramped accommodation with "minimum comfort and hygiene conditions", the MPT said.

Some workers slept on beds without mattresses and one toilet was shared by 31 people, it said in a statement.

The MPT also alleged that construction site staff had their passports confiscated and were working under "employment contracts with illegal clauses, exhausting work hours and no weekly rest."

Prosecutors said the workers had up to 70% of their salaries withheld and faced high costs to terminate their contracts.

"Slavery-like conditions", as defined by Brazilian law, include debt bondage and work that violates human dignity.

Sarasota Republican Congressman Greg Steube filed a bill that would cut $150 million in annual funding from the Washington, D.C. Metro system unless it renames itself to honor President Donald Trump.

Washington's Metro is the county’s most frequented public transportation system outside of New York City, according to the American Public Transportation Association. Steube's “Make Autorail Great Again Act” would cut its federal funding until it changes its name from the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) to the “Washington Metropolitan Authority for Greater Access” (WMAGA) and rename their rail system the “Trump Train.”

“In the spirit of DOGE, this bill demands accountability by conditioning federal funding on reforms that signal a cultural shift away from bureaucratic stagnation toward public-facing excellence and patriotism,” Steube said in a press release, referring to the Department of Government Efficiency Trump launched initially under the leadership of Elon Musk.

Stephen Hemsley who turns 73 in June, will get a base salary of $1 million a year—big money but actually below the usual salary for CEOs of such large companies. More important, he would get a one-time $60 million grant of stock options, with a twist: He would get the payoff only if he remains CEO for three years. He would get no other stock-based awards in that period.

The first group of white South Africans granted refugee status by Donald Trump’s administration has arrived in the US, stirring controversy in South Africa as the US president declared the Afrikaners victims of a “genocide”.

The Afrikaners, a minority descended from mainly Dutch colonists, were met at Dulles international airport outside Washington DC by US deputy secretary of state, Christopher Landau, and deputy secretary of homeland security, Troy Edgar, with many given US flags to wave.

Reuters reported that the group numbered 59 adults and children, citing a state department official, while Associated Press said there were 49.

On the same day the group arrived in the US, Trump’s government also ended legal protections that had temporarily protected Afghans from deportation, citing an improved security situation in the country, which is ruled by the Taliban.

One consideration for resettling Afrikaners not Afghans was that “they could be easily assimilated into our country,” Landau told reporters at the airport.

Trump suspended the US refugee settlement programme in January, leaving more than 100,000 people approved for refugee resettlement stranded. Then, in February, he signed an executive order directing officials to grant refugee status to Afrikaners, whose leaders ruled during apartheid while violently repressing the Black majority.