[yardie]

1. But how does that explain that Direct3D came out in Windows NT first? From what I remember the NT version was more advanced version released at that point (DX5 to 95's DX3) and they even managed to pack in a few games that took advantage of it (Pinball stands out). By my accounts it looked like Microsoft was using NT to position Direct3d with poor OGL thrown in for those too stubborn to move.

2. I think it's a bit more nuanced than that. OGL was a bear to program for. Microsoft wrote an easier API but it didn't get good until much later. If anything the OGL group should have seen this coming and done something about it. Instead they chose to ignore it at their own peril. Those other OSes were effectively dead by this point MS didn't need to move developers anywhere they were already captured.

3. Agreed. Even now there is no API like it except SDL, and even SDL is very very limited.

4. Agreed.

OpenGL collapsed due to a lot of things. The primary reason was the group itself. And this is the thing that anti-MS people ignore.