Windows 11 compatibility is representative of the Microsoft failure pattern I see again and again.
They introduce some new thing to replace an old thing and the new thing is indeed better than the old thing, but also pulls in a web of dependencies you don't really want while not fully replacing the old thing - thus everybody avoids the hassle of switching and they have to support the old things that stuck eternally.
They probably went "This time we'll do it like Apple!" and ... just made a hard cut for no reason, while not using the opportunity to actually significantly change things (despite having the things to change lined up; 10X had great ideas!).
Why do they keep messing up ecosystems so spectacularly? Are there any deep incentives at play or obvious things I'm missing? It doesn't seem like the CEO change had that radical of an effect on that behavior.
Other example off the top of my head: Microsoft Store/UWP/MSIX, (Windows Phone, API shenenigans)
They introduce some new thing to replace an old thing and the new thing is indeed better than the old thing, but also pulls in a web of dependencies you don't really want while not fully replacing the old thing - thus everybody avoids the hassle of switching and they have to support the old things that stuck eternally.
They probably went "This time we'll do it like Apple!" and ... just made a hard cut for no reason, while not using the opportunity to actually significantly change things (despite having the things to change lined up; 10X had great ideas!).
Why do they keep messing up ecosystems so spectacularly? Are there any deep incentives at play or obvious things I'm missing? It doesn't seem like the CEO change had that radical of an effect on that behavior.
Other example off the top of my head: Microsoft Store/UWP/MSIX, (Windows Phone, API shenenigans)
Counter-examples: XAML islands, ARM64EC