I have Windows 7 on my desktop PC and love it. I made the mistake of mentioning to my brother last year that I was looking at getting a lap top for trips out of town and he bought one as a gift for me last Christmas. It has Windows 8. Horrible, horrible! I never would have bought a computer with Windows 8 if I had a choice, but now I'm stuck.
I do not think the problem is W/8 or MS, but that too many people had PCs that do not really need them, or need a better one, as most all they do is surf and email. To write you could even use MS 3.1 with MS Office or 9X with OpenOffice.