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Comment by Avitas | Hacker News Reader

I guarantee that, shortly after the launch date, many tech media outlets will announce:

"XX million copies of Windows 8 shipped."

"Windows 8 sets record for [carefully worded phrase relating to sales volume]"

...et cetera.

Essentially, Microsoft will make a concerted effort to assure potential customers that Windows 8 is something that is being accepted. I guess that's no big surprise.

Will Windows 8 add significant or measurable value to the user currently using Windows 7, Vista or XP? I would argue that the value added for the vast majority of users will not exceed the paltry $40 upgrade cost.

In 10 years, will Windows 8 be viewed as another Windows ME or Windows Vista (i.e., minor updates that were largely viewed as worse than their predecessors)? I don't know, but my initial guess is 'yes.'

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I've always hated the "XX million copies sold" or "Fastest-selling Windows OS ever."

Windows sales are proportional to PC sales. New Windows OSes come out every 4 years. Assume the GDP increases 2% or 3% per year in that time, and PC shipments increase proportionally (heck, the population of the Earth grows that much).

Every 4 years you can automatically announce "This is the best selling OS ever, ~10% more shipments per month than the one we released 4 years ago".

Here's the press release for Windows Vista:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/features/2007/mar07/03-2...

"REDMOND, Wash., March 26, 2007 — Initial sales figures from Microsoft show its new operating system Windows Vista made a splash in its debut. In the first month of Windows Vista’s general availability, sales exceeded 20 million licenses, more than doubling the initial pace of sales for its predecessor, Windows XP. These initial figures reflect the broad interest in the security and usability enhancements in Windows Vista."

As expected, Vista smashes sales records compared to XP [GDP growth + 6 years of pent-up demand?]. Was Vista a more successful OS?

have you tried it? I want to bash on it but its actually pretty good. they have solved a hard problem of making an OS scale between laptop, desktop, and tablet. the interface is clean and consistent and increasingly the whole Microsoft line is coherent with a simular interface.

A problem that imo doesn't exist. A tablet is different to a phone is different to a desktop computer. This OS may be "solving" some problems, but it seems to be doing it at a cost, reducing functionality on the desktop. Besides, who even /has/ a windows phone or tablet? Who would want one?

Apple might disagree with you... There is a trend where OSX is getting slowly but steadily closer to iOS.

"reducing functionality on the desktop."

That's a pretty bold claim when the desktop still exists exactly like it did in Windows 7. Basically you're saying that all of the functionality of Windows came from having a start menu that is a couple inches tall and a couple inches wide, and by increasing that space it is now less functional. Listen to yourself, seriously.

"Besides, who even /has/ a windows phone or tablet? Who would want one?"

Millions. And to answer the second question, millions.

I don't really see any universe in which Windows 8 is a minor update.

Hopefully a few hundred million XP users will upgrade. For me, it's all about Internet Explorer. If Win8 does well, IE10 will be the new minimum for html5, and it's a lot better than the previous IE's.

http://html5test.com/results/desktop.html

Most non-corporate Win7 users should get the IE10 update too. In a year IE8 usage will be in the single digits.

I am not sure, what makes you think that people that didn't upgrade to windows 7 and ie9 will upgrade to windows 8 and ie10?

"IE10 will be the new minimum for html5" I'm not sure what this means, but it sounds horrible, I understand IE is getting better, but it did the damage in the early years, and it burnt its bridges with so many users and developers. I cannot see this changing while MS still execute "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish".

What that statement is saying is that the author believes the stable fallback on HTML5 means it will only need to degrade to the point that IE10 will render it.

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