[abraxas]

What killed of Microsoft's near hegemony on all personal computing was them losing the mobile wars. Until then they had a total dominance over the browser. IIRC IE6 had more than 90% market share some of which competed with older versions of IE.

Everyone should be cheering on this stumble because we came within inches of MSInternet that worked on IE only powered by the ActiveX controls or whatever other proprietary bullshit Redmond wanted to foist on us.

[jerf]

Oh, yes, I agree. I thought about that but thought it would just overcomplicate my point. I just think it is... ironic? humorous?... that ultimately the whole big rush to displace Microsoft was indeed based on correct logic... it's just that I can't imagine how it could have ever worked out for them by, let's say, 2005. The tech stack simply wasn't there and I can't see what would have changed that fact, even in hindsight. The web has nearly killed the Microsoft office suite... with Microsoft's web office suite.

[pjmlp]

Ironically they won the tablet wars due to Google not being able to move Android beyond phone apps in bigger screens.

Outside iPads, almost everyone doing serious work on the go is using Windows tablets in some form, either proper tablets, or hybrid laptops with turnable screens or detachable keyboards.