You don't know what you've got till it's gone

Hindsight is always clearer than trying to predict the future. Microsoft thought that the coolness of a new operating system would be enough to drive its sales up. Turns out, as we learn from this post on TechDirt, that now Dell is offering XP-loaded computers to its customers, again. That's so, like, last year.

Perhaps we are now learning that the XP operating system got it just about right. Powerful enough, cool enough. And it's pretty darn stable, too. Perhaps it could use some beefing up in the security department, but that's why I have PC-cillin. Belt and suspenders.

I have already blogged that I probably won't upgrade to Vista. There's no compelling reason to, because it doesn't give me anything I need. I'm not sure it even has anything I want, and that, I think, is the problem.

Maybe we can all wait for the next completely rewritten operating system from Microsoft, because Vista is moments away from imploding. It seems obvious to me that they need to go back and rethink the problem before they release something that is even more like Vista than Vista is already. (Huh? Dude, WTF are you saying?)

I don't think they're (MS) dead or even dying. But they did deliver a stillborn earlier this year. Time for them to reinsert their impetus and set about making something that will really rock.