You think getting people off XP will be hard, wait until it’s Windows 7

Microsoft hasn’t said anything about the end date for Windows 7 support: Windows Product lifecycle. Such a date will be determined at some point in the future. Usually it would be after the next major OS release. As the hints seem to be that “Blue” isn’t that release, so who knows when that will be.

By the time end of support rolls around, Windows 7 is likely to be as entrenched as Windows XP is today. Perhaps this because of the reaction to Windows 8. Although my wife and mum both like Windows 8, their enthusiasm relies on the caveat that I spent some time customizing the start screen for each person so that 95% of what they want to do with the computer was visible immediately. The new start screen works on the premise that you’ll customize it to suit yourself. Except most people won’t – so they’ll keep seeing the travel and the finance app.

I will admit I still don’t grok the removal of the button on the taskbar that allows me to get to the screen. I suspect that 90% of the antipathy towards the OS wouldn’t be there if the start button had been kept on the Win 8 desktop as a way to launch the tiled Start screen, sort of like it was back in the beta of Windows 7.

But back to today.

What today’s marketshare resiliency of Windows XP suggests is that once people find an OS that they like, they generally don’t want to shift off it. Even if there are great reasons to do so. Given how great Windows 7 is (and even with that greatness there is still a reluctance for some people to get off XP) – imagine for a moment what sort of incentive will need to be present to get people off Windows 7 when it approaches its end of life?

It’s an interesting question to ponder.

Luckily, Windows 7’s EOL is off in the comfortable future and in the present the concern is getting people off Windows XP.

If anyone can come up with an incentive that might work, I suspect Microsoft would love to hear it.