I read that article on zdnet that bill posted a link to. Makes a good point about compatibility being the most obvious reason computer users will probably opt to stay with a windows os. I think Microsoft had to try and get into the tablet market, and with hindsight it seems logical to see why they wanted to have an os that complimented that. Although pc sales (boxes) seems to be declining, and portable devices increasing (smartphones, tablets, laptops/ultrabooks) i agree that Microsoft seems to have left it a bit too late.
They should have gone with their courier tablet when it was announced a couple of years ago - it might have failed but they would have had a foot in the door to that market, and better information as to what users wanted to make the next venture more successful, or spun it off into a seperate division like the xbox. Win8 seems to trying to be all things to all users, and im not convinced it will be accepted by everyone. New pc buyers will get win8 by default and probably have no choice but to use it. Enterprise customers will stay with win7, and a lot retailers that use older EPOS style console programs wont want to move to win8. Power users & developers may migrate to see what its all about, but id expect most of them to have a dual boot setup or a 2nd machine anyhow.
I think when steam has linux compatible games there may a small shift to linux that may be the catalyst for a lot of migrations in the future.
Anyhows its all interesting to see what happens, im staying with my dual boot winxp/win7 pc for the while, and looking to buy a tablet in the future, probably a google nexus 7 if possible, win8 (desktop of surface tablet) doesnt hold any appeal to me at the moment.
