06.01.11
Gemini version available ♊︎There is No Windows 8, It is Vista With New Tweaks
Like ribbons on a pig
“In the face of strong competition, Evangelism’s focus may shift immediately to the next version of the same technology, however. Indeed, Phase 1 (Evangelism Starts) for version x+1 may start as soon as this Final Release of version X.”
–Microsoft, internal document [PDF]
Summary: Stating the obvious about an operating system that has not a single selling point of substantial value
“If Win 8 only includes the superficial features that are predicted, then it’s a tweak of Win 7, not a new OS, and we shouldn’t have to pay for it,” wrote John Dvorak last week. Microsoft is too busy trying to block Linux at OEM levels (Windows is dying in x86 land) and amid “Windows 8″ hype our reader Ryan, who is a former Microsoft MVP, says that the “same could be said of Windows 7″ as “it’s just superficial tweaks of Vista” (see our pages about 7 and 8, the better marketed versions of Vista). The promise of a ‘new’ operating system merely shows that Microsoft is nervous. █
ᶃ Gemini Space
This post is also available in 
Content is available under CC-BY-SA
twitter said,
June 2, 2011 at 9:34 am
Windows people like Dvorak are strange perfectionists who unfairly or ignorantly dismiss Microsoft competitors. GNU/Linux has what he’s looking for without costs and restrictions but he does not mention it and foolishly promotes OSX and Windows.
The first clue is that he thinks that the Vista family GUIs are comparable to OSX and does not mention gnu/linux. That’s laughable because the Vista/Vista 7 GUIs are infamous for user frustration and both Windows and Apple GUIs are ultimately governed by ugly digital restrictions designed to prevent sharing. GNU/Linux has no such restrictions but also has had easy, beautiful and more powerful interfaces all along. My first girl mastered KDE 3.x when she was 4 and my whole family has been using gnu/linux exclusively for about a decade.
The one promised feature he thinks is interesting has also been around for for about a decade. Sun made “On the go” almost a decade ago and live CD makers incorporated the feature, which one ups Microsoft by not requiring any OS on the target PC. The feature made a home directory on USB stick and also allowed the installation of applications not normally found on the live CD. Live USB sticks do the same today when the target machine can boot them. They can be encrypted, so free software users can now carry around a full, custom OS on a USB stick without risking their privacy. Dvorak himself thinks the feature will be crippled on Vista 8 and only mentions it because he thinks Microsoft still has a desktop monopoly and might be able to bully other non free software makers into accepting change.
So why does Dvorak ignore gbu/linux? It might be his insistence on the specific, non free applications he mentions. This also explains his admiration of Microsoft bullying which everyone should reject. If he were honest with himself, he’d realize that he could get work done well without those applications and it would not be any harder to do. Thanks to software patents and constantly shifting goal posts, no one will ever be able to do things exactly the way the non free programs do it . As long as he’s unreasonably attached to these specific programs he’ll always be promoting Windows, even when he thinks he’s criticizing it.
Dr. Roy Schestowitz Reply:
June 2nd, 2011 at 9:44 am
Historically, he is not so dismissive of the platform and last year he wrote me mail about trying Ubuntu on his machines. I guess that in order to write for IDG and big press he needs to stick to majority desktop markets, too.
twitter Reply:
June 2nd, 2011 at 7:56 pm
Yes, I remember him writing something about that in 2007 and having been happy with gnu/linux in 2009 [here], “Every so often I take a stab at Linux…” Oh my MoG, do we have Microsoft talking points shining through. He concludes as you did, “I cannot wean myself off Windows altogether because, well, I write about Windows.” Perhaps that will change before he’s able to retire. I also think he’s unreasonably attached to specific non free software like PhotoShop.
To wish him the best, I hope he does not have a retirement account full of MSFT. Such are Microsoft wages.