"With the introduction of OS X Lion, Apple gave us a glimpse at what a post-PC operating system might look like, and now Microsoft's gone and pushed that idea to the limit. If Cupertino's latest was a tease, than Windows 8 is full frontal. And we have to admit, we like what we see. "
Someone will no doubt say "it's a developer release – we'll fix all that". My response to that is "Apple would never let that see the outside of a top-secret lab".
Also, am I the only person who thinks this is the polar opposite of "post-PC"? Desktop, start menu, right-click, etc. Maybe "touch PC" is more apt?
I'm not suggesting the beta/dev preview version is without bugs, I believe you're reading too much into this.
The Apple model is just different. It's not "the right way" it's just "the apple way." High emphasis on developing in secret and only showing a locked-down finished product.
The fact they are releasing an OS a year before it hits shelves allows millions of developers to get a crack at building new apps.
One of the most attractive aspects of this to me is that I would not be developing just for a single device tablet OS. The applications will run across both tablets and desktops, and even a Microsoft "failed" Windows release is sure to see a massive uptake, especially as it will be the default OS on the vast majority of new computers.
It's not as if Microsoft haven't tried to do this before and failed and they're taking a pretty different approach to what's working in the market at the moment.
It's possible that Win 8 can be a success on the desktop / laptop but fail as a tablet OS.
As far as your point about whether Apple would allow people to see this, well, that's just the Microsoft vs Apple marketing philosophy. Apple typically presents things that are very highly polished and nearly complete, whereas Microsoft says "Hey, check out this thing we're working on." All else being equal (I'm not saying it is, but if it were), they both seem like viable strategies.
http://reviews.cnet.com/tablets/acer-iconia-tab-w500p/4505-3...
http://reviews.cnet.com/tablets/acer-iconia-tab-w500p/4505-3...
Acer isn't exactly known for brilliant power engineering, so a better vendor could likely do better. But this also wasn't exactly a high-powered chip, either. So this is probably a plausible baseline for battery usage in Win 7.
They need to beat this by quite a bit in Win 8, or the tablets will be a tough sell.
Secondly, I think many apps are priced to what the market will bear, not to recoup costs plus some profit.
Thirdly, running that store will cost MS money. They are not a charity, so I guess they will try and recover the costs in some way. What that way is, I do not know, but I would guess it would be in adverts, non-free options with better exposure and/or in the cost of Windows.
Cheat Sheet for People Who Type Stuff for Engadget And Want To Be Good at Other Things Too:
iOS = post PC
Lion = first step in bridging PC and post-PC
Windows 8 = [strikethrough] your grandpa trying to rap [/strikethrough] second step to bridging PC and post-PC