http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22103079 Global sales of PCs fell 14% in the first three months this year, the biggest fall since research firm IDC started tracking the industry in 1994. ... I would like to know how anyone could be surprised at this. IDC said 76.3 million units were shipped, a figure that underlines the appeal of tablets and smartphones an alternatives to PCs. I say it underlines how little innovation has been done in PCs of late. Even Apple seems to have placed the Macintosh on the back burner while they vigorously develop and promote their phones and tablets, so of course these products are going to be more popular! Plus, they're something relatively new and exciting, whereas the PC remains... the PC. The firm said Microsoft's latest version of Windows had failed to revitalise the industry. Holy crap. Windows 8 is disgusting. Its interface screams to be used on a touch-screen device, not on a desktop PC with a mouse. So, again, of course it has failed to help the PC market! I can't believe industry experts would even raise an eyebrow at this. The big tech companies have been pushing everyone into handhelds of various sorts for years already. To me it's like they've designed this PC slump, like it was their goal all along. It certainly benefits them, as not only do they get to sell a bunch of new products rather than upgrades to existing hardware, but handhelds afford them an opportunity to sell more new throw-away devices due to their lack of upgradability, and they allow companies to collect even more information about their users to use and sell to other companies. These little closed commercial platforms are great for developing and deploying "legitimate" spyware. I resist all of that mobile crap. The most mobile I am right now is owning an old Power Book, which of course is nearly as open a platform as a desktop Mac/PC. I can and do run Linux on it.
It used to be you almost had to upgrade every 2-3 years just to run the latest software. That's no longer as true. In addition, as you noted, tablets and smartphones are doing tasks once relegated to PC's. I don't even take a PC on sales calls anymore, there's nothing I need to do that can't be done with my iPad, and it's much easier to show my clients than a big clunky laptop.
Yep, there is no denying that tablets and smartphones are taking over many PC and laptop functions, and that does play a role. However, that being forced to upgrade in order to run the latest software.. That's another thing Linux is great for. I have the latest Debian system and its available software running on a couple of systems from 2005-2006. It's these commercial developers who try to force us into upgrades. They do it on purpose, and it galls me.
