Maybe using linux in schools.
I don't know, the crystal ball's been acting up.

It's ridiculous that countries all over the world are paying billions to Microsoft for a service that can be had for free

Because Linux wasn't that user-friendly back in the day, but right now if you plugin Ubuntu live image, it takes less than 10mins to install, then type in terminal sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade, type in password, wait for 10mins, your system is pretty much fully functioning. But people still can't handle it, it makes sense they need Windows to tell them what to do and update itself automatically