One of the things I really like about Ubuntu is that I can download and install the right version of a wide variety of program for my machine very easily. And

One of the things I really like about Ubuntu is that I can download and install the right version of a wide variety of program for my machine very easily. And it lets me keep up to date without thinking about it. A lot of programs don't update automatically and those that do are doing it right when I don't want it to--when I start the program up. If there was a similar system for Windows, I would definitely consider switching back. If developers have a good distribution system, there's greater incentive to invest more in making better software. There's a chicken-and-egg problem here since unless the platform has worthwhile programs, no one is going to install it, but Steam is one example, and Microsoft could do it themselves and that would guaranteed to be adopted, if there's no legal problems there. Distributing free programs (How about keep my Python and Notepad++ up to date?) would be a way to bootstrap as well. EDIT: Firefox Add-ons also looks like it's moving towards a store with donations as a preliminary trial, and remember add-ons can also be standalone applications running off of xulrunner: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=892073 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=892073