Why do you say it's baseless. MS did screw its PlayForSure partners (Creative, Rio etc), for example. WinMobile does suck. Pink is vapourware.
Why do you say all these things are baseless? Maybe you just dunno what you're talking about, if you don't, just say so, don't just say something is a baseless 'rant'. That's something a fanboy says.
It's baseless because the Zune is not considered a failure, nevermind the part about the NEXT Zune HD coming out ...you'd think Microsoft would've withdrawn from the market if it was indeed such a failure. Sure it's not Apple-Rule-The-Market success, but they're surely up there with Creative/Archos/Samsung/Sony when it comes to MP3 Players.
The thing that you and the author of that article is missing, Zune is an MP3 Player ...the Creative Zen is an MP3 player ...hell every electronics manufacturer got one. So this whole "copycat" thing is just baseless really. It's like saying a Samsung TV is a failure because Sony has more TVs on the market...wtf?
At least Microsoft offers and alternative, i definitely don't want Apple to be the -only- company with an Mp3 player, Phone, Laptop and Desktop + OS on the market. People hate Microsoft for exactly this reason, they got the Desktop PC market, 90% of it , people hate them on principle. Yet people actually WANT Apple to get in this position too? Apple on a corporate levels is no better than Microsoft, trust me..it's money..it's business.
Also just like the Zune, Windows 7 has ALOT of positive PR going, very few people are negative about Win 7 and you're digging up random blogs that is months old that is so freaking obscure that it's literally looking like someone is grasping at straws here. Really, everyone that has Windows XP or Vista, wants 7 ....
[Go read some Zune reviews, especially the 80GB/120GB reviews compared to Ipod classic...failure my arse]
And i can't believe you're still continuing to bring up the playforsure thing, that has absolutely NOTHING to do with Windows 7, in fact it has nothing to do with Windows at all. It's like saying the Microsoft Reclusa Keyboard is crap, therefore Windows is crap...