"Every three years or so Microsoft would sit down and create 'the next great OS'," he said.
"The developers would be locked away and out would pop a product based on what the world wanted three years ago."
Microsoft also had to spend a huge amount of money and marketing muscle to convince people that they needed this new version, and that it was better than anything that had come before, he explained.
Moving to a situation in which Windows is a constantly updated service will break out of this cycle, and let Microsoft tinker more with the software to test new features and see how customers like them, he added.
Most of the revenue generated by Windows for Microsoft came from sales of new PCs and this was unlikely to be affected by the change, Mr Kleynhans pointed out.
"Overall this is a positive step, but it does have some risks," he said.
"Microsoft will have to work hard to keep generating updates and new features, he said, adding that questions still remained about how corporate customers would adapt to the change and how Microsoft would provide support.
"It doesn't mean that Windows is frozen and will never move forward again," Mr Kleynhans told the BBC.
"Indeed we are about to see the opposite, with the speed of Windows updates shifting into high gear."
http://m.bbc.com/new.../technology-32658340Ok, here it is, the reason why Microsoft is offering a free upgrade to W10 for everyone, even pirates, is because they make very little on the sale of individual licenses direct to consumers upgrading their OS and make most of their money from the consumer market, via sales of new PCs with Windows preinstalled. And since this is unlikely to change in the future, why not make upgrading free?
So, it's very likely that the license for W10 will be tied to the PC it is installed on and non-transferrable to another PC, should the one you have die.
They say this will be the last version of windows and from here on out, there will be regular updates and improvements made to the OS, which every user will likely be entitled to for the life of their computer...an ever evolving version of Windows.
And since most consumers that pirate Windows are doing it to upgrade an existing system they purchased with Windows preinstalled, this should eliminate that entire category of piracy and even encourage those that usually opt to not upgrade, due to the cost of a new license, to keep their OS current.
The only people that will end up having to pay for a separate license of Win10 for each of their computers, are likely to be those that build their own, those that purchase a PC without an OS, and businesses that normally buy licenses in bulk.
So, for the foreseeable future, if you want to save money as a consumer, make sure your next PC is built to last, both in quality of hardware and specs. You want it to last as long as possible without it dying or becoming obsolete.
And this is good money saving advice, even if Microsoft wasn't planning on these changes. Buying or building a new PC every 3-5 years will cost you more in the long run than it would if you only did it every 7-8 years, regardless of what OS you plan on running on it. So this advice even applies to Linux users.
The main thing Windows using consumers have to worry about now is if Win10 sucks so bad that they don't want to use it (in which case you move on to another OS), or if Microsoft starts losing too much money if the sale of new PCs with Windows pre-installed takes a nosedive, and they decide to release a subscription based Win11 at some point in the future. (which again, you can move on to another OS)
So, in the long term this will either be great for Microsoft and Windows users, or great for Linux and Apple, and only time will tell.
