On the article content, I think Balmer is making an accurate statement. The market is relatively mature, and there's no real reason to rush out and change over, except for guys like you, who enjoy getting under the hood and having some fun with the innards of the system. I think Vista will come in at roughly the replacement rate for PCs, although I think they will continue to lose some market share to Apple and other niche manufacturers.
The fact that he's talking about Apple means that the ads have had the desired effect. I don't know how old you are, but I remember back during the soft porn magazine wars, Penthouse ran a series of ads mocking Playboy. At that time, Playboy was selling nearly 100 times the amount Penthouse was. By portraying themselves as equals in the ads, Penthouse positioned itself and for a while, actually passed Playboy in sales. Also, the percentage of operating systems in place is only one measure of success. Apple also gets the computer profit, and controls 70% of the market in portable music players and online music sales. This is a market MS desperately wants. In terms of total sales, Apple had 21 billion to MS' 44 billion last year. Microsoft is certainly bigger, but Apple's growth over the last few years is pretty phenomenal.
One thing about MS, is, IMHO, they operate out of fear as a matter of corporate policy. In his book, Business at the Speed of Thought, Bill Gates came across as a guy who believed there was really only room for one company at the top, and when that company fell, it went all the way down and was crushed by another company. When MS took on Netscape, for example, it was never about profits. MS simply didn't want a competitor. So, does MS fear Apple? Yeah, but they feared Netscape, Hotmail, Wordperfect, Lotus, Google, etc.
he was ASKED ABOUT THE APPLE ADS thats why he was talking about them... UNDERSTAND?
Apple isn't even on the the freaking radar. understand?