The premise appears to be that the world is moving towards touchscreen/mobile, and thus, the desktop computing experience is going to be relegated to the dustbin of history (because, you know, its not cool anymore). This is silly. Tablets have their uses, but they're a niche compared to a general purpose computer. There are a lot of things that are just very awkward to do on a tablet; ie, almost anything involving a lot of typing or creation of content. I could get along just fine without my tablet, but without my PC I'd be in rough shape. I like them both, but it's pretty clear to me which one is a powerful tool and which one is a luxury. So to be honest, I really don't care if windows 8 ends up being a failure as a tablet OS as long as it stays a decent desktop OS.
It seems like the thing to do is to place this topic in competitive terms, where somehow the success of the tablet implies that the desktop has to "die". Why is that? We can't accept that they all have their uses? I have both a hammer and a screwdriver, but I've never really felt the need to view them as competitors.
More than that, the problem with Microsoft is how much they lose by just trying to one-up. Apple has iOS for touch devices and OS X for PC devices, and Microsoft wants to make "one for everything" in fact torturing their huge PC user base with "touch for desktop" release, thereby alienating the users they depend on. Way to go, MS.
Comments
I think this article is specious.
The premise appears to be that the world is moving towards touchscreen/mobile, and thus, the desktop computing experience is going to be relegated to the dustbin of history (because, you know, its not cool anymore). This is silly. Tablets have their uses, but they're a niche compared to a general purpose computer. There are a lot of things that are just very awkward to do on a tablet; ie, almost anything involving a lot of typing or creation of content. I could get along just fine without my tablet, but without my PC I'd be in rough shape. I like them both, but it's pretty clear to me which one is a powerful tool and which one is a luxury. So to be honest, I really don't care if windows 8 ends up being a failure as a tablet OS as long as it stays a decent desktop OS.
It seems like the thing to do is to place this topic in competitive terms, where somehow the success of the tablet implies that the desktop has to "die". Why is that? We can't accept that they all have their uses? I have both a hammer and a screwdriver, but I've never really felt the need to view them as competitors.
More than that, the problem with Microsoft is how much they lose by just trying to one-up. Apple has iOS for touch devices and OS X for PC devices, and Microsoft wants to make "one for everything" in fact torturing their huge PC user base with "touch for desktop" release, thereby alienating the users they depend on. Way to go, MS.