From the Dark Side--Enlightenment at the Top of M$, the Mac OS X is Best

If you saw the Web news yesterday, you probably read that James Allchin, the Microsoft Executive in charge of Windows Vista development, stated in a 2004 internal email to Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer that "...he himself would buy a Mac if he didn't work at Microsoft." Maybe he would really buy a Mac or maybe he wouldn't but he'll soon retire from Microsoft so we'll see.

In his Vista Blog, yesterday Allchin explained the context for the remark, i.e. he was admitting that Vista development needed to change to be more ...er... Mac-like. This attempt to back-pedal from a strict literal interpretation of his remark simply lands him further from the Dark Side since he is basically admitting that the Mac OS X is much more what people really want in a computer operating system than Windows. Whether Vista achieves that, and we certainly don't think so from our use, time will tell once again.

When Allchin retires from Microsoft after Vista's release, we hope that Steve Jobs will give him a well-deserved retirement present, a fabulous 24" iMac Core 2 Duo running the equally or more fabulous Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard" for the candor that he is known for. [Bill Fox]