Also not at all equivalent to being forced into linking an online account before being allowed to use your computer at all.
It’s easily in my top 3 most hated things about my MacBook. Plus, knowing Apple and the history of that “feature”, it will only ratchet towards becoming even more of a pain over time (it was actually tolerable back before they removed the hotkey to bypass).
For me, after running Win11debloat one time Win 11 disappears into the background 95% of the time, like an OS should. Unfortunately I don’t the luxury of doing something equivalent on MacOS without completely disabling SIP.
Still unacceptable for home edition users, but Microsoft has been segregating its userbase and features into Home/Pro/Enterprise for decades.