According to Microsoft, the planned lifecycle for W10 is to end support on October 14 2025, so in two years time. It will then be a general downcycle of W10 supported sofware from third parties after this. For example, the W7 official support ended on January 4th 2020, so it took Valve 4 years for their support to end as well, If it follows the same pattern, then Steam support for W10 will end sometime in 2029.
What makes me furrious is the lack of AmigaOS 3.1 support

It barely even hit the market, it's too soon.

GOG being lazy and not carrying all that much about Linux is a poor argument for "supporting older OSes".

My point exactly. I was trying to say the situation is a bit better on GOG but not necessarily by design. GOG's aim is also to cater for modern OSes, like everyone else.

Because "Anyone who isn't using W11 right now should just go back to Windows 3.11 then" is just apples vs oranges hyperbole. Many things we take for granted now as being stable were a rapidly changing rat-race of almost annual 'core' architectural x86 redesigns (16/32/64 bit CPU's, MMX, SSE, ISA vs E-ISA vs VLB vs AGP vs PCI, Adlib vs Soundblaster vs Roland (with proprietary Mitsumi / Sony / Panasonic CD-ROM + GamePort interfaces), 34-pin floppy bus vs 40-pin PATA vs SCSI, RS232 Serial vs Parallel vs PS/2, "SuperFloppies", Firewire, RAM (FPM (1990) vs EDO (1994) vs SDRAM (1996) vs RDRAM / Rambus (1998) vs DDR1 (2000) vs DDR2 (2003) - 6 generations of RAM all came and went within the same time-frame we've had just DDR4 RAM / W7), etc, DOS vs Win95-on-DOS vs NT, manual IRQ jumpers vs Plug & Play, etc). Compare all that to minor iterations of USB, PCIe, & SATA that have been architecturally stable since the mid-2000s. That we have DOSBox & ScummVM to run mid 1995 software on W7 (after 14 years), whilst there's obviously no need for a "W7 Emulator" for W10 (also after 14 years) is simply due to 16-bit on 64-bit hardware limitations rather than some arbitrary "age" of the OS.

W95 vs W7 (2009) vs W11 today are all separated by the same 14 years but the need for a new OS every 3 years that was genuine in the 90s is mostly artificial today. We aren't going to need 128-bit CPU's vs addressable RAM limit for decades. PCIe, USB, etc, aren't going anywhere. When everything is that stable then the "need" for W10 > 11 > 12 -> Windows 365, "Subscribe Now!" every 3 years is nothing remotely like the 90s where Win 3.1 > W95 (just 3 years) added 32-bit CPU support, Plug & Play, LongFileNames (vs 8.3), etc, whilst all W11 adds on the hardware side vs W10 after 6 years is fake TPM requirements. That Microsoft is talking about introducing Windows 12 in late 2024 whilst W10's EOL is 2025 highlights just how pointless 3-year lifespan OS's (W11) are today.

Perhaps. I can understand super old OSes as a lot of API changes happened, but with XP and it's overtly extended lifespan it became a standard that everyone was basically happy with, not only software but hardware range and expected behavior.

I'm still reminded of having this webcam from 2005, which when i try to install the driver the installer says it's too old, but when i extract the actual drivers and install then it works just fine.

The bigger reason people may be forced to change systems is more drivers are said they aren't supported or they don't target the older windows. Which is too bad, since XP and Windows 7 are still very good OSes overall, and i'd much prefer over what Microsoft is pushing; Infuriating enough my not wanting consoles may push me towards Playstation 5/6 rather than Xbox or windows with how things are going.

LOL! I'm a great admirer of your sense of humour. ;)

I'm still on W7, for the time being. Others have warned me about the perils of not updating to W10. Yet, they have all gotten their systems infected or hijacked, at some point. I have not. This just proves that the "latest and greatest" won't ever protect a user with careless computer habits. :P

But sooner or later, I will have to move forward too, because Steam isn't the only one to have dropped support for W7: desktop versions of Signal and Firefox have recently joined the chorus. :(

But thankfully, I adore penguins! So, linux is on the horizon, but will still keep my W7 for legacy stuff. ;)

Welcome to GOG, nuieo805798345!

Well I will only dump win7 if my ESR version of the browser acts up on me in firefox. That happened to me with windowsXP when they no longer supported 32 bit systems. So I upgraded to windows 7 only for 2 years later them dumping windows 7. It is just a money issue for MS, they have been at it for years.

Windows 10 etc. all breached like windows 7 and others before. MS could avoid all of this if they would quit leaving back doors for themselves and government. No PC is secure using MS and never will be. It is just amazing to watch them force people to switch so quickly instead of it taking longer. Reminds me of Antivirus which use to have FREE updates to only now have to have a subscription service. Anyone thinking its better living today in this world than 30+ years ago is short sided of the tech.

Fixed that for you. Goes double for internet-connected devices. If someone really wants to break into your system they'll likely achieve it one way or another. The type of OS used is pretty meaningless.

The only thing a user can do is try to mitigate, but if someone's really got a raging hard-on for your system? Well, good luck! ;)