I agree with you in general, but not in the case of Windows 8. At first I was skeptical about it, but then I tried using it on a laptop with a good trackpad. I was rather amazed at how fast I could navigate the OS. I think the most complaint about Win 8 is the Metro/desktop context switch. In other words, people are more comfortable with having everything jammed under the familiar "Start" button, since that is where everything has been for almost 20 years. After using Win 8 for a few minutes on proper hardware, I became very used to the context switch. In a way, it serves as a way of convenient way categorizing apps. Multi-function, multi-window work = desktop. Singular task, single window touch centric apps = metro.

Mac OS, OTOH, is old and creaking. It has the same paradigm it was designed with in the 80s. iOS was clearly a step in the right direction for touch, but it is antiquated now, too. The rich gesture environment of Win 8 on a tablet makes it much nicer to use than iOS in my experience. YMMV. But in my view, it is Apple that is forcing users to adapt to their way of doing things, not Microsoft. I think it is safe to say that Microsoft did incorporate user feedback into Win 8 design. Apple seems to think they figured it all out with the original Macintosh. I am now beginning to believe that Win 8 will become quite popular, much to everyone's surprise - including me.

I don't think the iPad is as cool and hip as it was, simply because so many people have one now. This is a subjective assessment, and you might be right, but I think the coolness of Apple products is diminishing simply because of their ubiquity.

The big problem the Surface RT has is the lack of apps, but the presence of Office is not trivial. My guess is that the Surface Pro (and the 3rd party versions of it) will be popular, and that will attract Win8 developers, which will then make the Surface RT more compelling. Note also that the Win 8 phones will run apps that run on Surface RT.

The hardware is really much more compelling than the iPad. USB ports, memory expansion slots, more RAM than the iPad for the same money, and Touch/Type covers. I looked at a Surface RT in the store, and I have to say that the Touch cover was really easy to use. It is a compelling combination.

As for Win 8, IMHO it is more user friendly than iOS. Using the screen edges for gestures really makes the Win 8 touch experience much better than iOS. Again, this is subjective, and others may not like it. But it is a lot better than people think. Even Walt Mossberg liked the Surface, though he said it still needs refinement and of course - Apps. In my view, the real competition is now between the Nexus and Surface. Both are more compelling from a hardware perspective than the iPad. Kudos to Jobs and Apple for bringing us the iPad. Without it we probably wouldn't have the choices we have today. But in my view, the iPad has stagnated.

Short MSFT? I would be careful about that. If you look at the hardware features of the Surface (especially the x86 version) and the Nexus 7/10, I would guess that AAPL is the better short. Surface / Nexus are better, far more flexible hardware designs than the iPad . In terms of software, iPad still has a critical advantage, but I don't think this will last long. I think Cook has a real problem now. I looked at a Surface in a Microsoft store and had to say I was impressed with the touch cover. I think even Jobs would have appreciated its functionality. The type cover is even better, but costs more. The store was busy with lots of people looking at the Surface, but I have no idea as to how many they were selling. The sales person at the store said they were selling a lot of them, but who knows.

I intend to get a Surface Pro, and keep the iPad I have. The important thing to recognize is that I have no intention of upgrading the iPad now. I would get a Nexus 10 before buying another iPad. My guess is that when the Surface Pro comes out, they will sell well and developers will start porting the most popular apps, riding on the popularity / legacy Windows apps that will drive Surface Pro sales. As more apps are ported, the iPad's hardware limitations will cause serious problems for AAPL, especially as the increased number of apps makes the Surface RT and Windows 8 phones more compelling.

No one will be forced to use a vertical touch screen. The Surface comes with a keyboard. You can use the touch pad or a mouse if you want to. One thing Win 8 does when using touch that is really rather brilliant is make use of all four screen edges for gestures. In retrospect, iOS is seriously lacking this feature. IMHO, it makes a tablet much easier to use. As a touch OS, I think Win8 is much more user friendly and flexible than iOS.

Cook is becoming the new Ballmer. I plan to buy an x86 Surface when it is available. I will keep the iPad 1 that I have, but don't plan to buy another one. The Surface, if executed properly by Microsoft will be the killer hardware / software combination especially when linked with SkyDrive.

I have no way of knowing, but I would guess Microsoft expects Windows 8 to be adopted by Surface/tablet users first. Windows 7 will be the enterprise desktop of choice for some time. If things go according to Microsoft's plan, a few years from now users will be comfortable with the UI formerly known as Metro. Then the enterprise will migrate to Windows 9+ with whatever refinements it has. Whether this works or not, we shall see.

This comment by m_m offers a good perspective:

"Let me posit that HFT has driven a lot of people out of business: the specialists, execution brokers and day-traders who used to collect the large rents built into the system in the days of old. HFT and algo-trading practitioners are rent-seekers too, but their rents are far smaller. And the vast majority of the whining you hear is from exactly the people that HFT has displaced. I have read or heard nothing about how medium-to-long-term investors are being disadvantaged by HFT; to the contrary, their costs have gone down substantially. As for destabilizing the system, sure, a lot can be done to improve the market structure and micro-structure. But we have just come through one of the most volatile and unstable periods ever; did you really expect this or any market structure to survive through this without showing the occasional crack? And what you got, even then, was the Flash Crash and some instances of erroneous behavior, the most egregious of which was Knight. In the days of specialist-and-broker intermediation, we got Black Monday without any macro stress of remotely comparable scale; we got lots of (human) fat finger errors all the time, too. So, are you saying that it is morally and socially acceptable for one group of error-prone humans to extract large rents from the system, and it is not morally or socially acceptable for another group of (differently) error-prone humans to extract much smaller rents?"

If you think HFT is bad, then you must think $0.99 individual tracks, MP3 players, and digital distribution are also bad since the RIAA no longer dictates how you buy and what you do with the content. It's really not that much different.

I have a WP7 phone. It works quite well. Could it be improved? Yes. It is surprising that an ex-employee might be critical of his former employer? No. But one thing to note about phones - They are more like jewelry than computing devices for most consumers. As a consumer, I would be content with an iPhone, and Android phone, or a WP7 phone. The critical apps are telephony, search, mapping, and photo/video. All smartphones have this. Facebook, twitter, games, music apps, etc are largely supported on all phones now, too. Apps are becoming less of a discriminator in a purchase decision. Anecdotal evidence shows that now that iPhones and Android phones are ubiquitous, teens are becoming more interested in WP7 phones because fewer people have them. "iPhone? Like that's so yesterday!" If Microsoft and Nokia work on a good advertising campaign, they have a good chance for success, especially since the carriers don't subsidize phone in Europe and China.

I picked a WP7 phone because I can program it using .Net languages, which I use every day. The buying experience was abysmal. The rep wanted to steer me to an iPhone or an Android phone, since he didn't know anything about WP7 phones. If anything, the fact that WP7 sells at all in the face of such resistance from the channel suggests that the WP7 phone is a lot better or is a lot more appealing to the consumer for aesthetic or other reasons than people might think. I have no idea if Nokia will be successful with WP7 or not. But WP7 is a good mobile OS. If not Nokia, another vendor will be successful with it. I am happy with WP7, people I know who have WP7 phones are happy with them, too. iPhone owners like or love their phones. The interesting thing is that Android owners tend to be the least enthusiastic about their phones from what I can tell.

Well that makes two of us. There are aspects of WP7 that Microsoft should fix (why am I not allowed to use it as a USB drive without a hack), but Bing search and voice to text is rather amazing. On an unrelated note, people with iPhones tell me that while Siri is fun at first, eventually they stop using it because it is too slow. I look forward to the day when the phone can translate spoken languages.

I will recount my experience: I wanted to by a WP7 handset during the promotion Microsoft ran last year. I set up an appointment at the store to buy the phone. Get to the store and find out they are out of stock. Store people call around and find one left at a store a few blocks away, so I put that one on hold. Go to the other store to get the phone, and the sales rep suggests I should get an iPhone or Android handset instead.

I tell him I want the WP7 phone because I like the development environment for it. That still isn't good enough, so he asks if I am sure. I then ask him what he knows about WP7. Has he ever used it? No. I ask what he knows about WP7. He said he knew nothing about it, he was just more familiar with iPhone and Android.

After I finally convince the guy that I really did want the WP7 phone I had put on hold at the store, he activates it. Turns out he didn't really activate it, he bricked it. Obviously I should have checked it while in the store, but I never had a problem before. I took the phone to another store the next day to have it reset after spending an hour with customer support to try a manual activation which failed. Clearly the rep had no training for the phone. I have a hard time believing a typical consumer would put up with half of the hassle I did before they would say: "Give me an iPhone, this one doesn't work." It seems to me that Microsoft has totally dropped the ball with the sales force at the carriers. They should not be pushing the phone until the store reps are comfortable with it and show at least a little enthusiasm for the device. Microsoft should spend some of the marketing money flying reps to Hawaii or Vail or Jamaica or wherever sales rep paradise might be.

As for WP7, I do like what Microsoft has done in general. There are still rough edges here and there, but I would guess they will be addressed in future phone releases. The voice translation is amazingly good, and the Bing music recognition feature works really well. Turn by Turn navigation works well, too. I have not had any problems with crashes or the disappearing keyboard. The active tiles are nice, and a lot better than the icon infestation of iOS. I think it is at least equal to iOS and Android in terms of utility. But for me, the big selling point is not the phone, but rather Visual Studio and Expression Blend, which make app development much nicer that the pain of XCode. I haven't done much with Android, but colleagues who are developing for it tell me they would prefer to use Visual Studio, and that the fragmentation of Android really is a problem from a QA perspective.

To be good at any type of knowledge or artisan work, a person has to have some level of personal curiosity or interest in what the job involves. My guess is that most of the people who attend this event are doing because they want/need a job. The kind of person I would be interested in hiring would already be doing some programming in his or her free time. There will be a few people who attend who will discover that programming is something they really enjoy, but that group will be a small minority. OTOH, many others will find they dislike programming and will stay away from it.

Hopefully someone is going to track the results over time. Maybe a few of the attendees with initiative will create a database app to do just that.

North Korean State Television announced it will be the only approved tablet when available!

My guess is that the real story behind this incident is very different from what we might be getting from any source.

There are really two topics of discussion regarding the FTT.

1. Mitigate presumed negative effects of HFT
2. Create a new revenue source

If you listen to the interview, Gates appears to be pondering the merit of a FTT in order to increase the amount of revenue available for aid, presumably foreign aid for promotion of health care in poor countries. He says nothing about HFT, and also notes that if the FTT is too high, it could have negative consequences.

In my view, it is an extremely bad idea, especially if cast in terms of the "immorality of HFT", which few if any in politics understand to begin with. How is it that political figures are anointed best qualified to determine how long a person or legal entity owns a stock? If a FTT is matter or "market morality", what are we to make of short selling? How long will it be until someone in politics determines short sellers are Evildoers and should pay more FTT than buyers? Maybe the FTT should be higher for:

evilcoes ::= evilco | evilcoes evilco
evilco ::= tobacco | gambling | oil | coal | software

because we all know some people think software companies are evil, too.

What happens if someone has a losing stock position? Do they get a refund of the FTT? Should they only get if refund if they were long? People are complaining about HFT because they believe it distorts the markets, yet at the same time want to apply an FTT which can and will be changed to according to political whims. This in order to prevent market distortions? Speaking of markets and tax policies designed to benefit the public,what of the $140 BILLION the taxpayer just put into Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two entities that are back for more... The FTT is one of the worst ideas to be floated in response to the financial implosion. Full disclosure - I am an occasional day trader. What am I to make of the person who criticizes me for not holding a stock for a $ARBITRARY_TIME_PERIOD? Am I therefore entitled to criticize someone for upgrading from an iPhone 4 to a 4S? "You should not be allowed to change your phone more than once per year without paying an extra tax. I see you bought new clothes when your old duds were fine. You should pay more tax for that, too! Etc." That would be absurd. If you do or do not want to transact for a legal good or service, that is your choice. I have a hard time thinking of any transaction tax policy that actually accomplished anything good, but I can think of several that had deleterious effects.