“Sure as day follows night, sure as eggs is eggs, sure as every even-numbered Windows release is rubbish”

Some time ago I pointed out that Windows 7 would be a ‘good’ release of Windows compared to the ‘poor’ versions that the OS seems to alternate through (Windows 98, Me, XP, Vista, 7). It’s a bit like the ‘odd numbered Star Trek movies are rubbish’ rule of thumb. What happens when you extend the pattern to the major branding today? XP good, Vista poor, 7 good, 8 poor, 9 good?

Is it any wonder that Microsoft are as keen as possible to get to the next major version of Windows, even if it just a significant iteration on Windows 8? Half the battle will be won simply by the tech press saying “it’s an odd-numbered release, it’ll be fine.’

Meanwhile HP’s big selling point for January is that devices ship with Windows 7 ‘back by popular demand.’