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When using a touchscreen on a 13" ultrabook, the Win 8 start menu actually makes a lot of sense.

But forcing a touchscreen UI on everybody that doesn't have one is dumb. I don't see why they are trying to combine the two. Simply detect the form-factor, default to either the Metro or Win7 UI based on that and given people the option to switch.

I reckon, and I'm sure Microsoft and Apple do too, that screens without touch input will die out pretty quickly. Certainly within the lifespan of Win8 touch will be the norm.

And the Windows desktop in its current form is awful for touch screens, so it too will die out. Expect similar updates from Apple soon.

And we'll be expected to stretch our arms up to touch ever-larger-growing screens all day long?

At the moment I'm sitting in front of a pair of 27" monitors. Trying to use a touchscreen that big for extended periods of time is just going to be fatiguing.

I'm not saying it's going to replace mouse and keyboard but a screen that doesn't support touch at all will soon feel archaic. Even now I often find myself absent-mindedly trying to close windows with my finger on my dual-screen setup.

Remember that the ergonomics of a traditional workstation are driven by decades of mouse and keyboard input. As touch becomes more popular the layout will change to support that.

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