Summary: The next version of Windows Vista gets publicly criticised, but Microsoft will not take this lying down

Linux already does multi-touch, and it does it very well. In order to enable this, however, not only is software support required (it's built into Linux) but hardware support too. In fact, the whole hype about multi-touch on the desktop is to do with touchscreens, which are an old technology from the 1980s.

The facts suggest that Vista 7 has no "killer feature", except perhaps the ability to run XP, which hardly counts as a feature per se. Just being "not as bad as Vista" does not imply that Vista 7 is wonderful. That's what Microsoft wants the world to believe though, and highly-paid PR agencies were hired to impose this illusion. They are specifically assigned to protect the image of Vista 7.

Here is a new post from ZDNet, which is titled "Windows 7 Needs Liposuction." It says:

The complaint I have with Windows OS that Linux addresses to a certain extent, is that I can strip out or NOT install big chunks of software that is more rightly defined as application layer software instead of the bloat the has driven Windows into the ground performance-wise.

Scan the comments for potential Microsoft perception management [1, 2] in action (maybe just a Microsoft partner). They seem to be attacking any critic of Vista 7 with a load of text that ridicules the author and/or pitches all sorts of selling points. They hijack the conversation to guard the brand. Even Microsoft employees are instructed to comment in ZDNet under false identities.

Moments ago in the news we also found a rebuttal to Microsoft's touchscreen nonsense, which it tries to attribute to Vista 7. Microsoft is extolling the virtues of a hardware feature enabled by OS support that GNU/Linux already has (unlike Vista 7, which is not released yet).

Windows 7 touch: Dead on arrival

[...]

Whereas Apple quietly added touch to Mac OS X Leopard a couple years back, Microsoft has hyped its Microsoft Surface technology for more than a year. Beneath this hype has been the suggestion that, with Windows 7, a touch revolution is brewing.

Or maybe not.

[...]

Here are the key concerns that make PC touch useless for most people -- and that will continue to plague any notion of a "touch revolution" on the desktop PC for years to come.

The largest volume of Microsoft AstroTurfing will start next month. It is always the case when Microsoft has a major release of Windows (especially and more so with Vista), so experience simply suggests so. It's strategically crucial because Microsoft pressures businesses and OEMs to blindly adopt early. In addition, Microsoft will improperly count "sales" of Vista 7 to create hype. Whether those lies are capable of being reported to (and handled by) the ASA is another matter. ⬆

"[W]e're not going to have products that are much more successful than Vista has been."

--Steve Ballmer, a year ago