Jacqueline MoodyJammin’ Jests, Jukin’ Jives, & Jolly Roger Justice

Who’da thunk it?  Gartner has sung Microsoft’s praises for a long time.  Now, according to a computer world article, Gartner says Vista is in serious trouble and the situation is untenable.  I understand exactly what they’re talking about. 

I’ve been running Windows since version 1.0 and Vista since the initial release.  It looks absolutely stunning!  It runs like crap.  Copying large files or large amounts of files has never been more painful.  Microsoft worked for five years to develop Vista, but they didn’t spend the time with their major vendors to make sure there was a smooth upgrade path for drivers and applications.  It seems they spent more time ensuring the RIAA would be happy with DRM on OS. 

Microsoft showed with Vista that once again, they just don’t get it.  They even announced this week that they intentionally annoyed the users in Vista with UAC.  Are you kidding me?  This is about the most insulting thing I’ve heard of.  I understand the ISVs need to write secure code, but annoying the end user is absolutely the worst way to go about getting it done.  They succeeded on getting some ISVs to write more secure code.  They succeeded even better at annoying people enough that they did not purchase Vista.

Microsoft extended the ability to purchase machines with XP a couple of times due to consumer demand.  Now they have drawn a hard line for June saying you will not be able to buy a new machine with XP on it at that time (unless it is a low-end UMPC, like the cool Asus Eee PC!).  Once again, they just don’t get it.  They will drive more people to either the Mac or Linux camp.  Maybe this Gartner report will be a wake-up call for the technology giant.  We’ll see.  My prediction is they will keep their head in the sand.