I think the idea of having new frameworks being built upon the cross-platform layers now present in all the competing vendors, is really the most viable way for

I think the idea of having new frameworks being built upon the cross-platform layers now present in all the competing vendors, is really the most viable way forward. Instead of using one particular platforms' GUI framework - use only that which is common among each vendor, and fill in the missing with single-language, multi-target code, i.e. write once, truly run everywhere. So that's why I'm putting energy into things like libGDX and MOAI as a developer - the host-build-is-the-OS ethos really seems like the way out of this big mess that Microsoft has now made. ;)