Ballmer seems confident that Windows will continue to thrive well into the future according to his recent speech. He also made mention that Microsoft is working on being more interoperable with operating systems such as Linux and Unix. This is great news if he truly means it. Nothing would be healthier for them than a productive approach to the Open Source movement rather than the approach they took in the past.

Speaking to members of the Massachusetts Software Council, Ballmer said he was excited about the promise of technological advances in the next decade. But Ballmer shed his visionary mantle soon after, taking shots at the open source software development community and warning participants to think twice before adopting open source products like Linux.