From Infoworld: Forget about Windows 'Blue' -- stay focused on Windows 7
From InformationWeek: Tell Me Again: Why Rush Into Windows 8?
From Byte (a property of InformationWeek): Windows Blue's Got Me Down and Windows Blue/9: No Desktop? No Way!
A few observations:
Some reviews are fair criticisms, others are nostalgic almost-rants: Windows 8 is not a perfect product, nor is Windows RT, nor is the Surface tablet. Some reviews point out their weak areas: battery life, responsive to touch (or not), and consistency of user experience. Other reviews focus on the feature lost: the "Start" button and plug-ins for Internet Explorer (IE).
This opinion is not universal: These magazines are long-time fans of PC computing. In contrast, Dr. Dobbs is neutral about Windows 8 and PC Week has published several positive articles.
This negativity is new (for Windows): Previous releases of Windows have been met with approval from almost all Windows fans.
A reluctance to change: The disapproving users want Windows to remain the way it is. They want the "Start" button. They want to "boot to the desktop".
The Windows user base is not in agreement about the new Windows 8 offering. This is not a bad thing: A collection as large as the Windows user base will most likely contain diversity of opinions.
The negativity in the user base is, I believe, a new phenomenon in the Microsoft community. Previous changes in technology (Windows 95, Windows NT, the .NET platform, the C# programming language) were greeted with cheers. People immediately looked at the new capabilities in these technologies.
(OK, I will admit that Windows Vista was greeted with raspberries. But its problems were many and complaints were legitimate. Vista lacked drivers, demanded hardware, and offered few obvious improvements beyond a pretty desktop.)
The reluctance to change is, perhaps, the most significant of these observations. Microsoft supporters have long been willing to try new things, and often looked at new tech with envy. Microsoft may have built an empire, but the programmers were still in the Rebel Alliance -- scrappy, inventive, and risk-taking.
One can put forward a number of theories for this conservative shift in the fans. Most obvious is that the fans have built small kingdoms of their own, and the new tech threatens their standing in the empire.
A slightly uglier theory poses that Microsoft fans have aged, and the older versions of themselves are "too old for this sort of thing". (Yet Obi-wan Kenobi did a pretty good job, in spite of that claim.)
I have two pet theories:
Theory one: The Microsoft fans were surprised by the speed of the changes. They were not expecting the large change from desktop to mobile/cloud that is Windows RT and Azure. Being the emotional creatures that we humans are, they are reacting with fear and anger.
Theory two: The Microsoft fans are angry with the deprecation (or perceived deprecation) of Microsoft technologies such as Silverlight, IE plug-ins, direct access to hardware, and self-administration of systems. The loss of these (and other) technologies means that much hard-won knowledge is now worthless, and new knowledge must be gained.
I don't know which of these theories is correct. In a sense, it doesn't matter, because I have another theory.
The reason behind the negative thinking is not important. The negative thinking is the important thing. And I theorize that the people with the negative reviews of Windows 8, Windows RT, the Metro interface, and Azure will accomplish very little with those technologies. I theorize that the people asking for the "Start" button will stay with Windows 7 and its technologies.
I further predict that it will be the people who point at Metro and say "hey, this is cool!" will be the folks who deliver interesting apps and services for Windows 8.
Of the two groups, I prefer to work with the "hey this is cool!" people.
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