That's not comparable. The situations are quite different. Let me explain:

In your example: Windows. It's basically the "default" operating system. Billions of users. Some of those billions are kinda dumb and will type in a command or delete a folder because the Internet said so. Ok, so you ruined the day of some dummy with a practical joke. Not particularly funny, but whatever, it's just some dummy.

In the Linux example, here's how it goes. There's an alternative OS people can try out. People who are fed up with Microsoft. They install Linux for the first time, and what's their first experience? Some practical joke ruins their day. These are the people we want! The good ones. The ones brave enough to try out Linux, and their first experience is a dumb meme that ruins their day, or week, and totally turns them off from the Linux community.

This is not the same as pranking some dumb Windows users.