[Tom's] MarketWatch Slams Windows 8, Calls it Unmitigated Disaster - Page 23  

Originally Posted by Rubers 

Right after that speech. Steve Ballmer taped a duck's legs to wooden spoons, put the duck in a Ford Mustang, played Seal - Kiss from a Rose and ran around the room screaming at the top of his voice with his underpants on his head.

Originally Posted by Riou 

This might not end well for Microsoft.

Originally Posted by hex65000 

I simply drew the parallel between Unity and Windows 8 because they both have an interface style that does the following:
- Hides/removes features from the user.
- Appears to be geared for a touch screen.
As for your Linux rant, I dual boot primarily for gaming. Almost anything 'productive' I can do with a linux box and can stay completely away from the command line.
As an experiment, I dropped Mint13 on my partner's laptop to see what would happen. All I had to do was configure the system and turned em loose. As some background my partner isn't a tech savvy person and has an old PPC mac that still does a lot of lifting. Again, you have to ask: "How is the system going to be used?" If you answer "lots of current gen high-demand video gaming" eh, Linux is not the solution you want. In this case, it was browsing the web, Youtube, watching DVDs, and word processing. Yeah. Linux does those just as good as a Windows box.
The result was that my partner was functioning just fine soon after I deployed the machine. I do suspect driver compatibility issues and a crappy 5400rpm disc drive that wasn't being helpful. But there was never the moment of "I don't know what to do!" coming from a non technical person. Honestly, Ubuntu and Mint have done a nice job moving Linux towards being more MacOS like (Which at least way back when was a FreeBSD derivative.) So if you are saying that a tech savvy guy like yourself can't get over the dirt simple install and cannot do basic functions using Linux, that makes me sad. If it's just that it doesn't do what you need. (such as, play lots of games) I feel you. Wine is serviceable for some things, but you still get a performance hit, and is generally not worth the bother to me. That's why I dual boot.
While I don't like Windows 8, MSoft can push installs through the OEMs all day long. It's tough to get a laptop with no OS, and you could strip that junk out of there and HOPE you have Win7 drivers available, run Linux (and void your warranty according to what I will politely call the "moon logic" of some members here), or you run Win8. Regardless, you buy a copy of Windows 8. Ding! Microsoft sold a copy of Windows 8. OEM boxes sold to average consumers will come with Windows 8. You stand a better chance of getting no OS here, but last time I bothered to look -- a long while back, Dell and HP were discouraging it and in the case of HP, I think wanted to charge me more for that bare machine. Behold the near-monopoly power of Microsoft.
The corporate desktop space will be interesting to watch because big IT shops likely have a lot more clout with OEM vendors. Here there is probably room for pushback because if you are an OEM supplying a Ho-jillion boxes to P&G and they say they want windows 3.11 on every box you sell them. Yep. You are gonna do just that or they will find someone who can. Yes, I'm being extreme there on purpose to make the point obvious that if an OEM customer stands to sell a huge number of units with certain specifications, they are going to pressure their vendors to get them what they need.
I liked Dvorak's rant's from way back when; it's a shame that all those PC Magazine (or was it PC world) issues are long gone. His commentary on the direction of computing was usually compelling. That said, Win8 won't totally gutterball, because of some of the reasons above coupled with folks who MUST have the latest technology for whatever reason they have decided upon. Ballmer will likely keep his job at the helm, and Microsoft will likely say that their anti-piracy measures are working great because folks aren't pirating Windows 8 like they did with the previous generation of OS.
Whew! That was long. Hopefully the paragraphs broke that into readable chunks.
Hex.
[ Knows that one must select the right mallet for the job... ]

Originally Posted by Bubba Hotepp 

I think that's an understatement.
I've already predicted that Balmer will be fired within 6 months of the release of Win 8 (rapidly approaching). I would not be surprised one bit if Gates himself came out of retirement.

Originally Posted by Brutuz 

So Microsoft would have copied Apple again?

Originally Posted by GermanyChris 

If the idea of install MS on a computer did make me want to gag I would install this and see what the fuss is about..
If you have the Windows key is the loss of the start button so terrible?
hit the Windows key and type..