The biggest thing Microsoft should do is make the desktop king again. This is possible - users don't care whether they are using web applications or actual apps

The biggest thing Microsoft should do is make the desktop king again. This is possible - users don't care whether they are using web applications or actual apps, but there are huge benefits (in terms of what you can do) to desktop applications. This is evident in the amazing rise of Apple's App Store. But there's a problem. Web programming, while allowing generally crummier applications, has some benefits that far outweigh this. This is why startups tend to focus on web applications - they're just so much better for startups, for a few reasons. Find a way to give these benefits with desktop applications, and you'll have people rushing back to Windows programming, because you can give a much richer use experience. The benefits of web apps are: * Not having to worry about deployment. * Not having to worry about versioning (because the deployment forces everyone to have the latest version). * Being able to collect feedback almost automatically, ala Google Analytics. Preferably all kinds of different feedback about exactly how people are using your application. * Making life easier for the end user - no install, no configuration of things like which folders files are saved in (all the data is saved online automatically), etc. At the end of the day, all of this is achievable outside of the browser - it just requires a completely new framework for creating applications, which gives all these benefits for free. Not all desktop applications will be able to use it, but this will allow rich applications to be made without sacrificing the amazing benefits written above, which is why so many people turn to the web. P.S. I don't know much about Silverlight, which might be Microsoft's attempt to do just what I've outlined above. If so, then good going, but it still isn't being pushed hard enough since developers like me don't really know enough about it.