Well... I’ve been one for 24 years and I find a touch screen OS on a desktop to be horribly inefficient. And I have no interest in social media, or logging into Microsoft’s servers, or purchasing things from their store.
I’ve now installed Zorin OS on two client’s laptops and they’re very happy with it. Zorin isn’t going to take over the world, but the point is this.... Zorin has a “Look Changer.” The Look Changer lets you change your desktop to look and act like either Windows 7, XP, Vista, Ubuntu Unity, Mac OS X or GNOME 2. They wish to give the customer what the customer wants, which is the type of business that I choose to give my business. I am losing my loyalty to Microsoft in the same way as I have lost my loyalty to the Feds.
I find a touch screen OS on a desktop to be horribly inefficient
The most annoying thing to me: "There's a piece of lint on the screen. Crap! Now the computer's gone and done something!"
Classic Shell is free and will do the same for Windows 8, except for the Linux and Mac looks.
Or you can do as suggested and setup 8 to look and act very similar to 7. Microsoft changed the Start Button to the Start Screen, because their testing found that fewer and fewer people were using the Start Button. Most of them used the Taskbar instead.