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Doesn't really matter, Gym memberships work on this very principle. Also even if you half the numbers it is still pretty impressive the number of sales. "

But we're not talking about Gym memberships.

We're talking about Microsoft boasting about its sales and its misleading practice in how those numbers are determined. Two very different things.



Again it is still a purchase, it is still money going into the kitty.
"

Yes, it is money in the kitty.

Questions is: How many would have only purchased one license for what gave them what they wanted first if they were able to? Or if they were informed properly? Or if the product level did what they wanted?

The point is that the change in how Windows licenses were structured from XP to Vista and how those licenses were counted and compared was entirely misleading.



Adobe doesn't do the same thing, and hasn't changed the pricing model and compared apples-to-oranges boasting about its sales.




I fail to see how UAC is any different to OSX and Ubuntus "sudoing" to admin.

UAC was a good thing IMHO. I know it isn't perfect, but at least made people pay attention to the installer.
"

I agree, UAC is very much like the sudo functionalities in other OS's. The problem was not the introduction of it, but rather the lack of software being ready for it.

For MacOSX, there was a very clear line - the OS8/9 to OSX transition. Pre-OSX applications didn't have to concern themselves with a UAC feature, and OSX applications by had to by the very nature of the underlying OS that Apple adopted.

However, historically MS has been sloppy in APIs which require Admin/root privileges, and those which they've encouraged developers to use. As a result, many applications and APIs used functionality that was only suppose to be used by an administrator. When UAC was introduced, applications simply were not ready.

Now, it's not entirely MS's fault - MS had been telling application developers that the change was coming for several years.

So the issue with Vista was not so UAC itself, but how often the UAC interface came up due. Most of this was fixed by Win7, but it was considered a black mark for Vista - rightly or wrongly.



The Metro/Modern UI is a matter of debate, but it doesn't mean that Windows 8 is insecure OS or that it isn't functional in Desktop mode (tbh I really haven't missed the start menu).

However, Windows still remains a major security whole, and one that can only be plugged properly in a virtual environment. it's just the design of the system and its APIs. It's yet to be seen whether the WinRT API will help resolve the security issues of Win32 - I haven't looked at it very closely yet.

Actually Windows has been pretty damn secure since VISTA, most of the exploits require a user actually running code as Admin ... no system not even OpenBSD/Linux etc can protect against that. "

SELinux has the ability to. While it is not used much by normal desktop users, Linux has security capabilities that go far beyond what Windows has.



There are still many holes; many bugs that were reported back in Win3/95/4/XP/Vista/7 that are still there in Win8. Microsoft's policy is that they don't fix it unless it's being actively taken advantage of.

Now the changes in development method introduced during the development of Vista will certainly help. For example, Microsoft has had a very poor history of keeping fixes in places - it was a common occurrence that one patch would fix a bug and another would re-introduce it; and not uncommon for that to happen multiple times. With the refactoring that has been going on since the start of development for Vista that should be more under control - at least one would hope.



Most OS's are secure by default. Thus a firewall is not necessary. On Unix systems (of which OS X is part of) what you can do is limited - you can only open a port below 1024 if you are root; and if you are not root, any damage is limited to the user the software is running as. It is the same on Linux.



The malware for Windows is only in part due to its popularity. It is also (and more importantly) due to the design of the OS and the security issues that are prevalent within it. It is furthered by OEMs taking money to pre-install software that users may not otherwise want or buy.

And, Android does not really have an issue with Malware or Viruses. Yes, there are people that write some malicious stuff for Android; however, just like any other non-Windows OS the user has to specifically install it and grant it permission to do what it wants to do. Android itself has a far better security model than Windows ever had.

[p]The same security precautions on Windows can be said about any OS. [/q]

Windows - even Windows 8 - does not have the security precautions of the other OS's out there.

Windows was designed for a single user that, just like DOS, had full access and control of all the hardware. Security was an after thought for Windows.

Comparatively, all others OS's on the market - Linux, Mac OSX, VXworks, etc - were designed for multiple users from the start and as such security was designed in - even if only in basic form - from the start.

Before you start spouting off on how security is not an issue for any other OS because of MS's market size, learn a bit about the design differences between Windows and everyone else - they're very important when it comes to security.