Microsoft jumped the shark when they decided that C# was the only way your program could get onto the Metro UI. Give me C (or C++) or give me death! Or something like that anyway. Every other Windows release is traditionally a failure at release. Win95 was experimental and I view it pretty much as a failure, Win98 successful and much more stable, WinME a failure, WinNT successful, Win2000 kind of a failure, WinXP successful, Vista failure, Win7 successful. So, if the trend continues, Win8 will be a failure - on the desktop anyway - reserving judgement for tablets. But C# and the whole .NET ecosystem is the real failure. Despite what Microsoft thinks, there is a huge contingent of C and C++ developers out here still waiting for the day when they get off their C# unicorns and come back to reality.