The article is very misleading. Yes MS is trying to steer users to upgrade but since it still supports XP with SP3, how does that translate into trying to "kill" XP. Very poor logical argument.
Misleading indeed for the following reasons:
- the 2014 end of support has been known for many years years. How is that news?
- SP2 of course is not being upgraded since there is SP3. With this SP2 has an upgrade.
- XP doesn't get killed, not even after 2014. Anyone still can use it indefinitely, but it just won't be modernized anymore. The same way Mazda [insert your brand] won't show up in 5 years on my doorstep to upgrade my 2005 Mazda for free to be on par with a 2015 Mazda.
There seems to be the big MS-bashing and MS may have its shortcomings. But unlike other software vendors they provide 10+ years of
FREE upgrades. any other commercial software requires paid subscription. At work we pay $ 700 a year for auto desk subscription, $ 500 for Trane Trace, plus some other smaller ones and this just for one license. Buying a new OS every 5 years for a feeble $ 100 (or whatever we pay as a company) really is nothing. Especially considering the OS runs EVERYTHING and none of the other software would work at all. In addition the other software vendors arbitrarily change fiel formats every few years to force you to upgrade as soon as you exchange files with other people (which in commercial world you have to do). Besides their new fiel format they fix some bugs, not much else. and bug fixing should be free. So MS is not soooo bad.
And again, people are still able to use W 3.11 if they want to. It wasn't killed by MS. It was killed by the users themselves wanting something better.
People seem to expect to pay for an OS once in their life (or even pirate it) and to have a modern OS at no cost for the next 50 years. Especially considering that most hardware is not in serious use after 5 years anymore and 99.9% of the population buy ready-built-PCs or laptops that come with a new OS anyway.