Microsoft's restart - Windows 8

I have been reading a lot about the rave reviews that Windows 8 has been getting over the past few days and I have been giving thought to Microsoft's strategy in making the Windows 8 experience. It is increasingly clear from the past few years that ecosystems in general are going to be much more relevant in the tech world than an operating system itself, and while I still think that we are not living in a post PC era but we are living in one where all devices stay in sync with each other and therefore in that perspective, I can say that Microsoft's Windows 8 is headed in the right direction.

As an Apple fan, I too criticized Windows 8 as it adopted a schizophrenic UI with the Modern UI while still supporting the legacy apps and in some ways the mainstream tech reviewers are correct in saying that Windows 8 has a learning curve to which most people would throw criticisms. 

However I think we should see the long term "outlook" of Microsoft's approach. Microsoft has been a company whose software is used by the most number of people around the world. Apple mobile devices may be popular but desktop machines are on the high end of the spectrum which cannot be bought my most. It is this factor that makes Microsoft a big innovator. The mass market will use what Microsoft gives them - and this time it's an OS that says "Hey, it's time to move to the touch screen". Historically Microsoft has always given very good support to legacy software and hardware (try playing Doom 2 on a Windows 7 machine and it will still work) and so the explorer and the legacy UI is here to stay. 

In the recent years Microsoft was seen as a brand that stopped caring for it's audience and now it has equipped it's marketing department with an arsenal of devices to talk and brag about. The Nokia Lumia 920 and other Windows Phone 8 devices look very promising. Windows Surface tablet is a good start for Microsoft in the tablet world and things will only get better once the Surface Pro with an Intel processor comes along. The new Outlook.com email service has been made in conjunction with the rest of the Windows line up. In fact I am switching from GMail to Outlook to test how it performs. 

I am starting to get interested in the Microsoft Ecosystem once again as I was in the Windows 98 and XP era. This time Microsoft is clearly starting to show competitors that they were incorrect when they said that Microsoft has stopped innovating. From a business point of view I think building an ecosystem requires developers - who want to get the maximum downloads of their awesome apps done in a hassle free way. Adoption of the NT Kernel for developing apps for both the desktop and mobile world together would mean that it's easy for them to roll out the next awesome game to both the desktop and mobile platforms at the same time. Microsoft is clearly getting their game together and seem rejuvenated. It has taken it's strong points and made it better. With time the Windows Ecosystem will only get better. It's time to make a switch to Windows 8 - whether you like it or not, it's the future.