Well you very well could be correct but my gut says that is not the case. I base this on a few things:
-- WoW has attracted a lot more people to the MMORPG genre than before it's existence. As such many of those people have developed an expectation of what should be present. Many people have found a comfort zone with what WoW provides and will want that from any successor.
-- WoW did what Blizzard has always done in making a very polished game. Trust me I know well that WoW had it's share of issues with a multitude of things. But still that level of polish is the standard these days. Anything that will want to compete with WoW will have to be close to that. Which is of course never easy with the scope of a real MMO.
-- Finally I just overall think that there is nothing inherently wrong with the MMORPG model that WoW is. To say that something would have to be different to succeed I think is a bit of a 'slap in the face', to use a WoWism heh, to what is clearly a pretty decent model. Again not saying that something different can't be popular or good just that I don't think different is a requirement.
In my opinion, it will take a long time before another fantasy MMO comes out that has a similar real chance to take a substantial chunk of the market from WoW. If Warhammer couldn't do it, with all it's legacy behind it, it will require something truly spectacular to do it. Blizzard will need to screw things up at the same time that another company does a lot of things REALLY well with a hot IP (kinda like what WoW did to Everquest...). Warhammer had it's chance but missed the target. It'll be a while before another game has a shot.
I played WoW, TBC, and then just did a 10 day trial of LK. I'm of the same opinion. WoW will have to die of it's own natural cycle and then in it's place will need to be a new option for people who enjoy MMOs.
Our society(s) are going to have to accept the fact that even this modern world can be a dangerous place. We have become so insulated, and mind you I'm not trying to argue for some Quaker type of lifestyle; I fully love progress/tech/etc, by our progress that any small hint of danger is blown way out of proportion.
And then you get the "won't someone think of the children!" crowd who take this already exaggerated situation and blow it up to the nth degree...well you get what we have here.
And this may seem a bit tangent but I'd argue that we really need to use our progress to push our frontiers, IE space. Without any real frontiers to remind us all that life can be dangerous it's far too easy for people to slip into a very 'safe at any cost' mentality.
Are you joking? the day a board of directors would do anything for a reason other than to maximize profits, they would be sued straight away.
I see this come up all the time and it's kinda silly that when in the US we always joke about how you can sue for damn near anything but act as if you even whisper the word lawsuit to a board of directors they are going to run crying for their mommies.
Yes a board of directors is liable for it's actions and can be sued for not doing things that will further a companies goals. (Mind you this is different than always maximizing profits, something you also don't seem to understand.)
But no that does not always happen. As is pointed out it's still humans at the controls and mistakes are made, some decisions are made from more emotion than business sense, and other assorted nonsense.
Great points. I'll just add thou that in acting like you prescribe you need to be aware that there will be genuine assholes who you'll have to work with. And further since said assholes have gotten ahead by being that way they will see you as one of their own and want to befriend you.
And as I pointed out in another post most of those types of people are not assholes all the time rather just when it suits their purposes. So you have to be prepared to watch that type of behavior from some of your peers at higher levels and deal with it in whatever way won't stress you out too much. (I like to make sure said people know that they are assholes over drinks so that it's clear where we all stand. Trying to make sure I don't fall down into the same asshole mannerisms that they do while said drinking occurs is the interesting part.)
Someone below me did a great job of putting out what I think being 'nice' can mean:
One of the things ascribed to the "nice guy" that is presumed to hurt them is that they take responsibility for failures.
A lot of organizations with political problems have a sort of "blame-oriented" culture. When something goes wrong, someone has to be blamed, and that person must be made to suffer. This is, of course, bad, because it focuses on punishing someone rather than solving the problem.
But that's not what I want to touch on. But rather the mentality of being a nice person overall. In our culture there is indeed the view that being nice means weakness. And here is the kicker that I've observed, if you are nice but still stand up for yourself; you are the one who gets labeled the asshole rather than the real assholes!
As I've seen it most assholes are always on the lookout for themselves. But of course most people who are like that are not assholes every waking moment. They just rather tend to be very self centered, will lash out when things go wrong, make jokes at others expense, in short they act like assholes. And in any culture that this behavior has been accepted it's not given any thought.
So if when a nice person: someone who will think about others, is not prone to lashing out when things go wrong, will not make jokes, you get the idea; is confronted with someone being an asshole to them and then is confronted with an asshole trying to take advantage of them the asshole will then turn around and try and call the nice person an asshole! I'm probably painting a poor picture here but damned if I've not seen it happen often.
Yeah, true true. But most of the time we like to at least pretend that those in public office have gone though enough of a process to weed out really dumb people.
And when that illusion is shattered we then like to point an laugh.
I understand what your saying but let me just clarify what I mean.
During a conversation someone says something and the 'geek' then has a chance to respond. So they think about what they would want to respond with but in that time someone else has already responded and the conversation is moving forward. So they instead end up not saying anything most of the time because instead of quickly responding with whatever comes 1st.
It's not a rationalization rather just an effort on most 'geeks' part to give the 'right answer'. But in a social setting getting things right is not often the issue. In fact as a geek who has already admitted to over thinking things I've spent a lot of time listening to all the 'normal' people and have thought to myself: Damn these people say some stupid shit. And they are boring.
I mean don't get me wrong there is plenty of room in my dime store psychology to add rationalization into the mix. It however is different than what I was saying.
I'll preference this quick with my own bias. I've gone though life as an above average looking geek. I base that on the amount of relative attention I've gotten from the opposite, and sometimes the same and while thx guys-not my cup of tea, sex. And notice I said attention not necessarily action. That is because...
As someone pointed out social IQ has a lot to do with what happens 'in life'. How does this social IQ get formed? Well by in large I believe it is done naturally as people grow up. We are very social animals and so normally a lot of trial and error shapes the way that people learn to interact. However 'geeks' and other social recluses go one of, and there may be more but these are the two that I have noticed, two ways.
1. They remove themselves from socializing to an extreme degree. 2. They are involved in socializing activities but over think everything.
I personally am a bit of #1, I am a geek after all that code/PCB/story/whatever wasn't going to write/build itself. But mostly after many years of introspection, go figure, it's been #2. In most situations normal people, and I feel really dirty writing that because it could easily be a put down or myself bragging but have to express it some way so blah, don't think about what they might do or say. They instead will just act upon it. Those that actually learn by that trial and error method are those who become normal people.
Now keep in mind there are those normal people who don't even learn from that normal trial and error method. And I damn sure know that there are plenty of people out there who are socially backwards without the backup of even being smart. The damming thing about being smart and socially backwards is that you know that your being socially backwards but feel helpless do do anything about it.
So anyway back on point for those people who over think things in social settings I wonder if any course is going to help. Seems to me like it would just reinforce that mentality. Rather as a number of people have said they need to actually go out and socialize. Even at the risk of being uncomfortable and making a bit of a fool out of themselves.
Keeping in mind that that those normal people already did it and made fools out of themselves too, but just did it in the get out of being a dolt free zone of being young. And finally that being even pretty good at being a social creature never removes the chance of being a fool. Rather just reduces that risk. (Of course some of my better memories involve being rather foolish.)
That these machines would not run half as well as some system that would cost half as much but built by someone with a clue. Not just someone who went down line and picked out parts based on how much they cost.
For anyone really interested in performance rigs spend some time on a overclocking site. Those guys and gals really will show what it's all about. I know I'm damn amazed at some of the stuff they pull off and have learned a bunch just browsing.
People spend way too much energy badmouthing the opposing party, and not enough towards cleaning up the party they support.
As trite as it may be I'm afraid this falls into the 'pick your battles' category. It's hard to be a part of a party and be in a position to enact any real change if your not a part of that party.
Or to put it another way, to be a part of any large party/group you are going to have to accept that there will be some imperfections within it. Any large party is not going to exactly keep members around who are looking to 'clean up' things all the time.
That is not to say that groups should not police themselves. They damn well should and imo the Dems have done a fair job doing that. But I am saying that the practical reality of existing with, and working with, large groups is accepting that they are imperfect.
It would be even more funny if the right wing, who are doing a good job of making McCarthyism look tame, have the social progress evaporate as women are disenfranchised, then kicked out of their jobs, abortion is banned, homosexuals are stoned, writers are jailed, directors shot, dancers raped, just like, well, every other country where Islam has taken over.
Oh wait...the right wing has been doing that already. Go figure.
I'm always a little amazed at how it's a damned if you do and damned if you don't type of world we live in. If the people in question did not get a little pissed off, in a righteous indignation type of way, then why golly they might actually have been plotting something right? I mean that's how the far right wing would spin it. Because as we are so often told if we have nothing to hide why do we fear these sort of acts?
I guess I'm always a bit confused at exactly how pissed off people are allowed to get when stuff like this happens. But I know for damn sure that no matter what those people do it's always either too much or not enough. Because someone like you will always try to turn it around and make them the 'bad guys'.
For what it's worth please take this one Americans apology. Understand that there are many of us who are very pissed at what has happened to our country. As well as what it's done to so many people in this world.
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." -- Benjamin Franklin
I'd further add that a significant majority of the 'gun camp' are also part of the religious right. And given how they have their own very specific views on what exactly should be granted as Rights they aren't going to be teaming up with anyone but like minded people any time soon.
This seems like one of those ideas that sounds great when your in a room full of like minded people. IE people who can't see past MS everything on computers. But in the real world it has so many failure points it's laughable that it even got out of that room.
I can only see this pushing more people to use OO and such. The idea that I would pay per hour to use anything that would not normally have to be networked, IE like MMOs, is laughable.
Newspapers were considered so important to the country that the first amendment to the Constitution preserved the freedom of the press.
If we follow that what you say is true, which I don't but lets for the sake of argument, then horse carts were also considered important to the country at that time. However you don't see the US still keeping that industry afloat. Rather it's the free press part that matters.
Newspapers are dying out due to technological advances. By virtue of what they represent it's more sad than with other things that have done so. And of course they will go down kicking and screaming. I'll personally miss a cheap way to line a kitten or puppies floor area. Or an alternative to a drop cloth when I'm painting something.
Furthermore I'd argue that I'm willing to bet the author does not even consider that some software is just plain bad. Couple that with the return and very questionable status of the First Sale doctrine it's no surprise that some people choose to look at software 1st before plunking down virtually nonrefundable monies on it.
I'll grant that of course there are those who are going to opt for getting stuff for free no matter what. If the author had any integrity he'd mention how software piracy is used often to test software before you buy. (No I did not RTFA and if he did at least give a nod to said argument then I suppose I'll cut him/her some slack. I'm betting thou it's more more of the typical black and white kinda view of the world that is easy for people to understand yet does a horrible job in actually expressing what goes on.)
My main point is that is the Vista 'upgrade' really is just not worth the trade off. Indeed there are real functionality upgrades to the UI. There are a number of nice things for enterprise environments in the OS. It can actually look pretty cool.
But bottom line is that an OS should be functional first and foremost. And the added functionality that Vista provides does not offset the functionality it takes away for most people.
Not trying to bash you or Vista but your examples are pretty weak.
Accessing the Device Manager: On XP click the start menu, right click computer, go the the correct tab and click the "Device Manager" button. On Vista click the start menu, type "Device" and click on "Device Manager".
Not only is accessing the Device Manager not something that really needed near instant access but that your saying that one whole extra click makes the UI better is reaching.
Removing a program: On XP click the start menu, click "Control Panel" and click on "Uninstall program". On Vista click the start menu, type "Remove" and click in "Add or remove programs".
Again not something that really requires, or should have, near instant access but in addition most programs in XP put a "Uninstall program X" in their start menu folder.
Configuring Windows tasks in general: On XP find whatever obscure way to change what you want one window after the other. On Vista type what you want to do.
That Windows itself is finally giving people CLI options is good. But since your example is so vague and really could apply to any OS I'm not even sure what point your trying to make.
Browsing the Web with firefox while listening to you MP3 collection: On XP open an idiotic page with a hidden MIDI playing in a loop, you mute the computer and curse the site; you music is gone. On Vista open the same idiotic page, click the volume tray icon and mute firefox, the MIDI is no longer audible and you can keep listening to your music.
Vista allowing users to mute individual apps is nice. I personally use Opera most of the time so I've never had to worry about the problem you list anyway thou. Your best example.
Vista has a few decent UI improvements but I still think the grandparent post and yours reach in trying to make Vista out to be better than it is. And ultimately most people have seen it for what it is. The few perks it has has not outweighed the bloat and system performance hit.
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Well you very well could be correct but my gut says that is not the case. I base this on a few things:
-- WoW has attracted a lot more people to the MMORPG genre than before it's existence. As such many of those people have developed an expectation of what should be present. Many people have found a comfort zone with what WoW provides and will want that from any successor.
-- WoW did what Blizzard has always done in making a very polished game. Trust me I know well that WoW had it's share of issues with a multitude of things. But still that level of polish is the standard these days. Anything that will want to compete with WoW will have to be close to that. Which is of course never easy with the scope of a real MMO.
-- Finally I just overall think that there is nothing inherently wrong with the MMORPG model that WoW is. To say that something would have to be different to succeed I think is a bit of a 'slap in the face', to use a WoWism heh, to what is clearly a pretty decent model. Again not saying that something different can't be popular or good just that I don't think different is a requirement.
In my opinion, it will take a long time before another fantasy MMO comes out that has a similar real chance to take a substantial chunk of the market from WoW. If Warhammer couldn't do it, with all it's legacy behind it, it will require something truly spectacular to do it. Blizzard will need to screw things up at the same time that another company does a lot of things REALLY well with a hot IP (kinda like what WoW did to Everquest...). Warhammer had it's chance but missed the target. It'll be a while before another game has a shot.
I played WoW, TBC, and then just did a 10 day trial of LK. I'm of the same opinion. WoW will have to die of it's own natural cycle and then in it's place will need to be a new option for people who enjoy MMOs.
I did indeed, mah bad!
Our society(s) are going to have to accept the fact that even this modern world can be a dangerous place. We have become so insulated, and mind you I'm not trying to argue for some Quaker type of lifestyle; I fully love progress/tech/etc, by our progress that any small hint of danger is blown way out of proportion.
And then you get the "won't someone think of the children!" crowd who take this already exaggerated situation and blow it up to the nth degree...well you get what we have here.
And this may seem a bit tangent but I'd argue that we really need to use our progress to push our frontiers, IE space. Without any real frontiers to remind us all that life can be dangerous it's far too easy for people to slip into a very 'safe at any cost' mentality.
Somewhere deep in the pits of hell some RIAA exec has been heard to utter something to the effect of...
"Dammit, but we had a deal!"
Are you joking? the day a board of directors would do anything for a reason other than to maximize profits, they would be sued straight away.
I see this come up all the time and it's kinda silly that when in the US we always joke about how you can sue for damn near anything but act as if you even whisper the word lawsuit to a board of directors they are going to run crying for their mommies.
Yes a board of directors is liable for it's actions and can be sued for not doing things that will further a companies goals. (Mind you this is different than always maximizing profits, something you also don't seem to understand.)
But no that does not always happen. As is pointed out it's still humans at the controls and mistakes are made, some decisions are made from more emotion than business sense, and other assorted nonsense.
Great points. I'll just add thou that in acting like you prescribe you need to be aware that there will be genuine assholes who you'll have to work with. And further since said assholes have gotten ahead by being that way they will see you as one of their own and want to befriend you.
And as I pointed out in another post most of those types of people are not assholes all the time rather just when it suits their purposes. So you have to be prepared to watch that type of behavior from some of your peers at higher levels and deal with it in whatever way won't stress you out too much. (I like to make sure said people know that they are assholes over drinks so that it's clear where we all stand. Trying to make sure I don't fall down into the same asshole mannerisms that they do while said drinking occurs is the interesting part.)
Someone below me did a great job of putting out what I think being 'nice' can mean:
One of the things ascribed to the "nice guy" that is presumed to hurt them is that they take responsibility for failures.
A lot of organizations with political problems have a sort of "blame-oriented" culture. When something goes wrong, someone has to be blamed, and that person must be made to suffer. This is, of course, bad, because it focuses on punishing someone rather than solving the problem.
But that's not what I want to touch on. But rather the mentality of being a nice person overall. In our culture there is indeed the view that being nice means weakness. And here is the kicker that I've observed, if you are nice but still stand up for yourself; you are the one who gets labeled the asshole rather than the real assholes!
As I've seen it most assholes are always on the lookout for themselves. But of course most people who are like that are not assholes every waking moment. They just rather tend to be very self centered, will lash out when things go wrong, make jokes at others expense, in short they act like assholes. And in any culture that this behavior has been accepted it's not given any thought.
So if when a nice person: someone who will think about others, is not prone to lashing out when things go wrong, will not make jokes, you get the idea; is confronted with someone being an asshole to them and then is confronted with an asshole trying to take advantage of them the asshole will then turn around and try and call the nice person an asshole! I'm probably painting a poor picture here but damned if I've not seen it happen often.
Yeah, true true. But most of the time we like to at least pretend that those in public office have gone though enough of a process to weed out really dumb people.
And when that illusion is shattered we then like to point an laugh.
I understand what your saying but let me just clarify what I mean.
During a conversation someone says something and the 'geek' then has a chance to respond. So they think about what they would want to respond with but in that time someone else has already responded and the conversation is moving forward. So they instead end up not saying anything most of the time because instead of quickly responding with whatever comes 1st.
It's not a rationalization rather just an effort on most 'geeks' part to give the 'right answer'. But in a social setting getting things right is not often the issue. In fact as a geek who has already admitted to over thinking things I've spent a lot of time listening to all the 'normal' people and have thought to myself: Damn these people say some stupid shit. And they are boring.
I mean don't get me wrong there is plenty of room in my dime store psychology to add rationalization into the mix. It however is different than what I was saying.
I'll preference this quick with my own bias. I've gone though life as an above average looking geek. I base that on the amount of relative attention I've gotten from the opposite, and sometimes the same and while thx guys-not my cup of tea, sex. And notice I said attention not necessarily action. That is because...
As someone pointed out social IQ has a lot to do with what happens 'in life'. How does this social IQ get formed? Well by in large I believe it is done naturally as people grow up. We are very social animals and so normally a lot of trial and error shapes the way that people learn to interact. However 'geeks' and other social recluses go one of, and there may be more but these are the two that I have noticed, two ways.
1. They remove themselves from socializing to an extreme degree.
2. They are involved in socializing activities but over think everything.
I personally am a bit of #1, I am a geek after all that code/PCB/story/whatever wasn't going to write/build itself. But mostly after many years of introspection, go figure, it's been #2. In most situations normal people, and I feel really dirty writing that because it could easily be a put down or myself bragging but have to express it some way so blah, don't think about what they might do or say. They instead will just act upon it. Those that actually learn by that trial and error method are those who become normal people.
Now keep in mind there are those normal people who don't even learn from that normal trial and error method. And I damn sure know that there are plenty of people out there who are socially backwards without the backup of even being smart. The damming thing about being smart and socially backwards is that you know that your being socially backwards but feel helpless do do anything about it.
So anyway back on point for those people who over think things in social settings I wonder if any course is going to help. Seems to me like it would just reinforce that mentality. Rather as a number of people have said they need to actually go out and socialize. Even at the risk of being uncomfortable and making a bit of a fool out of themselves.
Keeping in mind that that those normal people already did it and made fools out of themselves too, but just did it in the get out of being a dolt free zone of being young. And finally that being even pretty good at being a social creature never removes the chance of being a fool. Rather just reduces that risk. (Of course some of my better memories involve being rather foolish.)
That these machines would not run half as well as some system that would cost half as much but built by someone with a clue. Not just someone who went down line and picked out parts based on how much they cost.
For anyone really interested in performance rigs spend some time on a overclocking site. Those guys and gals really will show what it's all about. I know I'm damn amazed at some of the stuff they pull off and have learned a bunch just browsing.
You need to reinstall your sarcasm detection package.
People spend way too much energy badmouthing the opposing party, and not enough towards cleaning up the party they support.
As trite as it may be I'm afraid this falls into the 'pick your battles' category. It's hard to be a part of a party and be in a position to enact any real change if your not a part of that party.
Or to put it another way, to be a part of any large party/group you are going to have to accept that there will be some imperfections within it. Any large party is not going to exactly keep members around who are looking to 'clean up' things all the time.
That is not to say that groups should not police themselves. They damn well should and imo the Dems have done a fair job doing that. But I am saying that the practical reality of existing with, and working with, large groups is accepting that they are imperfect.
It would be even more funny if the right wing, who are doing a good job of making McCarthyism look tame, have the social progress evaporate as women are disenfranchised, then kicked out of their jobs, abortion is banned, homosexuals are stoned, writers are jailed, directors shot, dancers raped, just like, well, every other country where Islam has taken over.
Oh wait...the right wing has been doing that already. Go figure.
I'm always a little amazed at how it's a damned if you do and damned if you don't type of world we live in. If the people in question did not get a little pissed off, in a righteous indignation type of way, then why golly they might actually have been plotting something right? I mean that's how the far right wing would spin it. Because as we are so often told if we have nothing to hide why do we fear these sort of acts?
I guess I'm always a bit confused at exactly how pissed off people are allowed to get when stuff like this happens. But I know for damn sure that no matter what those people do it's always either too much or not enough. Because someone like you will always try to turn it around and make them the 'bad guys'.
For what it's worth please take this one Americans apology. Understand that there are many of us who are very pissed at what has happened to our country. As well as what it's done to so many people in this world.
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." -- Benjamin Franklin
I have no clue but I've seen some strange moderations lately myself. It looks to me like the meta-moderators are slacking, myself included.
I'd further add that a significant majority of the 'gun camp' are also part of the religious right. And given how they have their own very specific views on what exactly should be granted as Rights they aren't going to be teaming up with anyone but like minded people any time soon.
This seems like one of those ideas that sounds great when your in a room full of like minded people. IE people who can't see past MS everything on computers. But in the real world it has so many failure points it's laughable that it even got out of that room.
I can only see this pushing more people to use OO and such. The idea that I would pay per hour to use anything that would not normally have to be networked, IE like MMOs, is laughable.
Newspapers were considered so important to the country that the first amendment to the Constitution preserved the freedom of the press.
If we follow that what you say is true, which I don't but lets for the sake of argument, then horse carts were also considered important to the country at that time. However you don't see the US still keeping that industry afloat. Rather it's the free press part that matters.
Newspapers are dying out due to technological advances. By virtue of what they represent it's more sad than with other things that have done so. And of course they will go down kicking and screaming. I'll personally miss a cheap way to line a kitten or puppies floor area. Or an alternative to a drop cloth when I'm painting something.
Furthermore I'd argue that I'm willing to bet the author does not even consider that some software is just plain bad. Couple that with the return and very questionable status of the First Sale doctrine it's no surprise that some people choose to look at software 1st before plunking down virtually nonrefundable monies on it.
I'll grant that of course there are those who are going to opt for getting stuff for free no matter what. If the author had any integrity he'd mention how software piracy is used often to test software before you buy. (No I did not RTFA and if he did at least give a nod to said argument then I suppose I'll cut him/her some slack. I'm betting thou it's more more of the typical black and white kinda view of the world that is easy for people to understand yet does a horrible job in actually expressing what goes on.)
Fair enough. But that the government in question is trying to charge them at all for gathering GPS data is pretty lame.
My main point is that is the Vista 'upgrade' really is just not worth the trade off. Indeed there are real functionality upgrades to the UI. There are a number of nice things for enterprise environments in the OS. It can actually look pretty cool.
But bottom line is that an OS should be functional first and foremost. And the added functionality that Vista provides does not offset the functionality it takes away for most people.
Not trying to bash you or Vista but your examples are pretty weak.
Accessing the Device Manager: On XP click the start menu, right click computer, go the the correct tab and click the "Device Manager" button. On Vista click the start menu, type "Device" and click on "Device Manager".
Not only is accessing the Device Manager not something that really needed near instant access but that your saying that one whole extra click makes the UI better is reaching.
Removing a program: On XP click the start menu, click "Control Panel" and click on "Uninstall program". On Vista click the start menu, type "Remove" and click in "Add or remove programs".
Again not something that really requires, or should have, near instant access but in addition most programs in XP put a "Uninstall program X" in their start menu folder.
Configuring Windows tasks in general: On XP find whatever obscure way to change what you want one window after the other. On Vista type what you want to do.
That Windows itself is finally giving people CLI options is good. But since your example is so vague and really could apply to any OS I'm not even sure what point your trying to make.
Browsing the Web with firefox while listening to you MP3 collection: On XP open an idiotic page with a hidden MIDI playing in a loop, you mute the computer and curse the site; you music is gone. On Vista open the same idiotic page, click the volume tray icon and mute firefox, the MIDI is no longer audible and you can keep listening to your music.
Vista allowing users to mute individual apps is nice. I personally use Opera most of the time so I've never had to worry about the problem you list anyway thou. Your best example.
Vista has a few decent UI improvements but I still think the grandparent post and yours reach in trying to make Vista out to be better than it is. And ultimately most people have seen it for what it is. The few perks it has has not outweighed the bloat and system performance hit.