Firstly for pixellany - you got me there. I hold up my hand to A, B, C, D
, and E
Paying for it, is not restricted to the original software costs. In more significant lumps, it is fighting hangs, slowdowns, re-installs, countless reboots, deflecting unwanted advertising, keyloggers, spyware, trojans, and locking down/avoiding features that would leak my life to the world. I put so much "learning curve" getting used to the ways of some applications, I feel the same way anyone would when contemplating a MS divorce! I guess the more invested, the stronger is the feeling not to let go of it.
chrism01 is right about the apps that have no Linux counterpart. I do not just mean whether or not one can check out a u-tube video. The more seriously significant the computer application, the less important it seems is fonts, bells and whistles, look-and-feel, or even what OS it runs on.
In some fields, like airfoil design, I even suspect there is UNIX software that has no worthwhile Windows replacement. There are significantly powerful CAD suites in mechanical engineering and electronic/microwave design where some might have Linux versions, but are all so expensive that for me, the choice has been to achieve what I needed to do without the bells and whistles, often using open-source stuff modified. It leads me to question whether so much user time at computers is really useful "computing". Not so long ago, a computer more feeble than any modern Pentium/Athlon with a filestore way smaller than some discs found in modern laptops was enough for the entire USA tax system.
The Windows PC is not yet abandoned, but it had better be good for more than Sudoku/Freecell/eBay sessions, or it will soon become part of a dual-boot sandbox.