Forget the Files and the Folders: Let Your Screen Reflect Life [New York Times: Technology]
The above is a good article for two reasons. One it lays out the Microsoft situation well. Without Microsoft and it's "horrible" Windows product developers would never sleep. Imagine making your software work on 15 different OS's in the name of competition. Secondly it says something I've been saying for about 2 years now. The OS is a commodity...it's not as important as it was. There are two ways to change this and Microsoft is trying them both. First off they're tying in more and more products to the OS in an effort to maintain it's importance which will only work for so long. Users will take a slightly less tied version of your software on a different OS if they like the OS. Messenger is not a reason to buy Windows. The other method is to completely redesign and redefine what an OS looks like and is. As mention in this article Longhorn (the next version of Windows due out I believe now in late 2004) will sport a completely re-tooled UI. Think 3D. Gone will be the start menu and the folders and all their ilk. It (from what is being said about it, which isn't much) will sport a more task based UI where similar things are grouped and placed in docks around the screen in an effort to make the desktop your defualt screen. I think they might be taking my other idea of using the desktop more like an empty container where you can snap in consoles for what you want (think for teens snap in IE, Messenger and Media player, for adults snap in Excel, Word and IE.) Everything stated about this new UI though has been highly praising to the point where I almost wonder if they found a reliable way to do a full 3D UI like in all the computer movies. Either way the OS is not the thing to be anymore and Microsoft knows this. Look for them to expand into markets you've never even thought of.
4:07:01 PM 
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