The Relevance of Windows

Josh Fink writes "ZDNet has up an article exploring whether of not Windows is still relevant. In the age of 'Web 2.0' both older folks who remember the days before Windows and younger folks who have never known anything else are beginning to see Microsoft's offering as old news. From the article: 'Before closing the books on the Age of Windows, however, let's not get too caught up in the fashion of the moment. The water-cooler crowd may take a dim view of "Win-doze" for all the right reasons. Still, Microsoft's archrivals continue to view it as a product with a potentially make-or-break impact on their businesses. In fact, two of them--Adobe Systems and Symantec--are lobbying European regulators to get tough on Microsoft. The European Union already has an unresolved antitrust dispute with Microsoft, and Adobe and Symantec would be silly not to play that card for all it's worth. So this is what they're doing.'"

Comments

Is the Operating System Dead?

[eldavojohn]

I read an interesting article about the operating system being dead and it contained the choice between a machine with your favorite operating system or a machine with your most hated current OS but with access to the internet.

And, you know what? I must admit that I would take the machine that had the connection to the internet regardless of what current OS it had on it.

So, not only is Windows no longer relevant, but the functionality of the operating system itself may have been trumped by our ability to communicate with other people. This doesn't invalidate operating system arguments but it does cause one to wonder about what is really important when you're getting a machine to work & play on.

Re:Is the Operating System Dead?

[gartogg]

Wait a second...

The ulitimate goal of a technology is to get to a stage that it is so good, it is invisible. Then it's irrelevant, in these terms. It still matters, of course, but there is no differentiation.

There are plenty of irrelevant things with huge market shares. The point here is that operating systems have been commoditized, and are no longer important - The analogy you could use is that you don't care which brand of gasoline you use, but you care about your car. Of course, as computers evolve, new technologies become old, and then commotized. I cared about the computer architechture, then they all got to be good enough that I cared about by hardware (video card, ram, etc.) Then I stopped caring as long as everything worked.

I used to care about my OS, then they all became sufficient to get to my web browser and do the other tasks I needed done. Then I cared about my browser, but they all became good enough to use the web apps that I wanted, so I'll mostly stop caring about those as well.

It's all about Photoshop, Sonar and Eve-Online

[PopeRatzo]

I'd be happy to change to a non-Microsoft operating system right now. I'd even spend some money to do it, but I've got a handful of programs that I just can't run on anything but Windows, and that's a stopper for me.

If I can't load Adobe Premiere, or Sonar or Eve-Online in Linux or OSX, it's no good to me. I'd even be happy to switch from Sonar back to Logic Audio Platinum and I can run Premiere on a Mac, but still there's Eve-Online.

If I even have to WORRY about whether I can run my favorite apps, I'm not going to change to a different OS, even if there are lots of reasons for me to do so.

I know from experience that I can work longer, with less fatigue, on a Mac than on Windows or Linux. I prefer the look and feel of OSX. I love the idea of open source operating systems, and I like the way Linux can be made bulletproof without sacrificing all sorts of performance and resources. But still... I can't run my favorite apps.

So who's got to change, me or the manufacturers? Am I supposed to switch to Linux with the hope that if enough of us do so the software manufacturers will start to port their apps over to Linux? I don't have time for that.