(This isn't directed directly at you Bill, but rather in general to the respondents in this thread):

You are all still thinking in terms of some money-based reason for this change. Or as Craig thinks its for standards reasons. It's not for either of those reasons. They're not even close. Those are smoke-screen explanations designed to outwardly sound good while enabling the real purpose to sneak by without drawing attention to its most sinister nature.

Please listen!

Microsoft is moving people into controlled ecosystems. It's the purpose of Win8's huge changes over Win7. It's the purpose of WinRT. It's the purpose of Microsoft's app store. And they're not alone. Apple is moving that way. So is Google. So are all big companies. They are taking cues from the Business Intelligence layers which have been proven atop social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. They mine data and learn things about people and powerful entities have realized you can track significant information about a person. And because there is value in knowing those things (just like with food cards which offer you discounts so they are outwardly desirable, but are actually designed to track what you eat and how often, or "Like" buttons on every web page so Facebook can track your entire Internet activity because who ever logs out and clears their cookie cache after leaving the site?).

We're being analyzed and taken apart systematically through algorithms which are continually tweaked and perfected, and which have just recently become sufficiently complex to warrant garnering all data on people rather than just what they can get through passive means. As such, these new systems are being created to herd us into controlled ecosystems like cattle. Oh, there will be value in what they offer. It will make sense to move into those places. But we also are not going to have any reasonable choice.

The rest of this message continues in this thread: Message ID: 1571153