Microsoft to push Windows towards subscription model

[FlameOn]

Microsoft is going to be pushing windows towards a subscription based model with Microsoft Blue in the coming years. Apparently this is to provide a "more steady stream of updates to the consumer" when it more clearly appears to be a money grab considering windows XP had more than a decade of active support for the price of the initial purchase
http://www.theverge.com/2012/11/28/3...pdate-low-cost

What is even more concerning is that windows 8 will be dropped shortly.

Microsoft will stop accepting apps that are built specifically for Windows 8, pushing developers to create apps for Blue

Since Windows Blue will be released mid-2013, Windows 8 seems to be DOA much like Windows phone 7 will be. This really doesn't help the growing perception that Microsoft is doomed as per article below. Good jobs running the company further and further into the ground Steve Ballmer.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/anthonyk...trophe-theory/

[Rathji]

Just to clarify, the article actually says...

Once Windows Blue is released, the Windows SDK will be updated to support the new release and Microsoft will stop accepting apps that are built specifically for Windows 8, pushing developers to create apps for Blue.

Also, it doesn't say that new apps won't be able to run on Windows 8 machines, it only says that apps designed specifically for Windows 8 won't be accepted.

I have no issues with this. Apple has had no problems killing backwards compatibility at certain points in their development cycles. At some point you really just need to be able to start fresh and tell people to suck it up.

[CaptainCrunch]

Microsoft hasn't been making good decisions for a while. I took a look at Windows 8 and passed,I hated the UI, and the fact that you needed a touchscreen monitor to run it was just a terrible decision.

Windows 7 to me was great and its stable.

How long until Bill Gates comes out of retirement to save his baby?

[FlameOn]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

How long until Bill Gates comes out of retirement to save his baby?

Bill's gone onto bigger and better things like helping out kids in Africa and trying to save the US economy with Warren Buffet.

[GreenLantern]

I am a big fan of Windows 7, much more than XP and definitely a lot more than Vista.

But I guess they are due for a few crappy versions now..

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by FlameOn

Microsoft is going to be pushing windows towards a subscription based model with Microsoft Blue in the coming years. Apparently this is to provide a "more steady stream of updates to the consumer" when it more clearly appears to be a money grab considering windows XP had more than a decade of active support for the price of the initial purchase
http://www.theverge.com/2012/11/28/3...pdate-low-cost

What is even more concerning is that windows 8 will be dropped shortly.



Since Windows Blue will be released mid-2013, Windows 8 seems to be DOA much like Windows phone 7 will be. This really doesn't help the growing perception that Microsoft is doomed as per article below. Good jobs running the company further and further into the ground Steve Ballmer.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/anthonyk...trophe-theory/

Windows 8 is not being dropped.

It's a somewhat sensationalist (or just badly written) article that people are going to jump to conclusions about (already happened in this thread) if they don't read it properly. Blue is just an alternative stream. Microsoft has been moving to subscription, user based CAL models, and more cloud (think Office 365) in many areas lately but Windows 8 SP1 and Windows Phone 9 are still all slated for 2014.

Was just in a roadmap meeting with Microsoft and Blue wasn't even mentioned. Blue is just a strategy for a low-cost offering providing updates and features for a fee and developers will be encouraged to build apps that have cross-platform compatibility. They have a huge problem right now with software compatibility between Windows 8, Windows 8 Phone, and different hardware architectures (ARM, x86 with Surface RT and Pro). Office 2010 is available on Windows 8 but it's not designed for the UI at all, that will change with Office 2013. They are also getting rid of the differentiations between versioning (Pro, etc.) Windows 9 Phone is supposed to be the full fledged version of the Windows 9.

This is just another version of what's already happened in the enterprise sector with subscription software and cloud platforms like Office 365 (you don't own Office, you subscribe to it and get all the support from Microsoft's data centers).