Microsoft’s Windows 8 Gamble Just Might Work

I don't think the difference between multi and single (mouse) touch is a huge problem to overcome. There's no game-breaking technical challenges to develop solutions that bridge touch and mouse+keyboard interfaces. When you have a mouse and keyboard, you are using (at least) single-touch, and no onscreen keyboard is required. When you are on a smartphone or tablet, you have multi-touch and an onscreen keyboard may be required. It's not terribly complex, although some consideration may land on application developers (e.g. changing views when an onscreen keyboard is displayed, if necessary).

Windows 8 looks pretty great. It's nice to see stuff bleeding from mobile back to the desktop. The blurring of lines between mobile and PC is a good thing. Mobile is the true PC and the way we use our phones and tables should very much dictate the way we use our workstations. Mobile computing is the front line of HCI.

I think that having a shared experience across your phone, your tablet, and your home and work PCs is a great idea. Especially since they can essentially do the same things these days.

Forget "Cloud" computing, "Ubiquitous Computing" is far more exciting and relevant. In my opinion it's shared platforms that don't distinguish between hand-held and desk-held machines that will permeate our connected lives.

It's good to see MS take this kind of risk. Like many others I'm currently committed to their platform as a developer, and I believe they have a truly great ecosystem with .NET - but it's the company that pushes forward and tries new and risky things will always be most interesting. In this case it's good to see that it's the one who I've sunk time and effort into.