As a user of bother OS X 10.7 and WP7, I have to say at this point I have more faith in Microsoft to successfully push the desktop UI envelope than Apple. Lion

As a user of bother OS X 10.7 and WP7, I have to say at this point I have more faith in Microsoft to successfully push the desktop UI envelope than Apple. Lion is pretty much a mess of conflicting UI and usability concepts, and Mountain Lion seems to be more of the same. Unless Apple is planning on completely overturning their entire integrated UI model (causing massive disruption to their carefully constructed iOS-OS X ecosystem) in the next couple of years, I think we're just going to see more of the same - basically a continued push to polish and refine the basic 90s desktop UI paradigm. Microsoft in the mean time seem to be pretty intent on throwing out all the old conventions and building the interface of the future. The tech industry is interesting, success can be very short-lived, and can come at a high cost - inflexibility. Microsoft is in a flexible position, and can move much faster than Apple. Apple's success in the late 00's may hamstring it for the next stage of the digital arms race. It's just a question really of how sharp Microsoft's strategists are.