Retirement was not the fate many customers likely would have chosen for Microsoft's Steve Ballmer. Something unpleasant involving wolverines would have been more like it—especially if you were among the countless corporate foot soldiers recently required to upgrade an underpowered company-issued laptop to Windows 7 because of Microsoft's withdrawal of support for its long-lived XP.
It was once possible to gaze on Windows with admiration. The complexities it tackled on our behalf were awesome. It was churlish to complain about the occasional blue screen or long boot-up times.
But sometimes a reality only needs to be stated out loud: The joy of Android and Apple devices lies not just in those devices themselves, but in the fact that they allow us to perform computing tasks without %^$# Windows.
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