Friday Rant: Hey Microsoft! How about some more dialog about Vista before moving on to Windows 7?

It’s a Friday (again!) so that means time for another Friday Rant!

Yesterday Microsoft indicated that it might be getting ready to peel back the almost Apple-like secrecy surrounding Windows 7 by unveiling a new blog called E7 co-authored by Steven Sinofsky and Jon DeVaan. The tag team of Sinofsky and DeVaan make the following promise:

We strongly believe that success for Windows 7 includes an open and honest, and two-way, discussion about how we balance all of these interests and deliver software on the scale of Windows. We promise and will deliver such a dialog with this blog.

Ummm, guys, that's all very well and good, but how about some more dialog about Vista before moving on to Windows 7?

Stuck for ideas? Allow me to offer a few.

Windows Ultimate Extras.

Did you think I'd forgotten about those, did you? You know, that stuff that folks who bought the Ultimate version of Vista paid around $100 extra for.

Is a poker game (take a look at Apple's poker game in the App Store to see how this should have been done), a CPU-sucking (and, overall, sucky) video desktop app, BitLocker (which, deep down inside, you know should have been included will all versions), some sounds and a huge bunch of language packs all we're going to get? If it is, I'd really like to know ...

Security patches

Allow me to point you to my blogging colleague Ryan Narainefor details of plenty of security vulnerabilities that are in dire need of being patched. If you want to start a dialog someplace, how about explaining this:

... take a peek at this upcoming advisoriespage maintained by TippingPoint’s Zero Day Initiative.  It lists a whopping 20 unpatched vulnerabilities that have been reported to Microsoft, some more than 200 days ago.

Vista Capable

Yeah, what went wrong there? I know that there is an ongoing class action suit here, but a little honest transparency about what went wrong wouldn't go amiss.

Pushing non-existent features

Yes, I know that Live Photo Gallery can correct for exposure problems, but it's not Photoshop and it can't airbrush out wrinkles. What happened there? I'm all ears!

See, there's plenty to talk about ...

Thoughts?  And remember, since it’s a Friday, you can vent your spleen about anything tech-related that annoys you!