My Windows 7 confession (and why you should confess, too)

They say that confession is good for the soul -- or the mind. I'll make mine but insist that you read no further unless you're willing to make yours in comments. Deal?

My confession is the real reason for running Windows 7. In September, I wrote "Why I chose Windows 7 over Snow Leopard (and why you should, too)." In that post, I explained about Windows 7 being my primary operating system since January on two different Sony VAIO notebooks (I see from comments how many Betanews readers remember the Sony rootkit and just love the company for it). As I explained in that post, two primary reasons led to my picking the newer version of Windows over Mac OS X: Windows 7's fresh, new user interface and VAIO Z720 hardware features -- mainly higher-resolution display -- compared to 13-inch MacBook Pro. But neither of these reasons is why I stuck with Windows 7, even for the productivity gains realized from using the operating system over Mac OS X Snow Leopard.

As much as I like Windows 7, there is still no iLife equivalent for Windows. The need -- the want -- for iLife has left an empty longing for Mac OS X. After all, people buy computers for applications not operating systems. I blame Microsoft's severely back-asswards content strategy for my terrible Mac OS X longing.

The company controls the last-generation application stack: Office-Windows-Windows Server. Office productivity suites defined PC computing during the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s. There is enormous infrastructure and huge revenues tied up with this aging, and quickly becoming ancient, application stack. Microsoft seeks to preserve this aging stack through productivity suite ties to SharePoint Server and with new versions like Office 2010, which is beta testing now and due for release in June next year.

The application stack of the present and future is in the cloud. Most people generate content on a non-PC device, manipulate or edit on a PC and share via the Internet -- perhaps by email or more likely Facebook or other online community or service. Granted, text is often created on a PC, but who really uses Word, other than a few stuck-in-the-past businesses -- and, of course, Microsoft? (If you use Word, it's OK to confess.)

Wordprocessing is a commodity. The basic formatting features most people need are available in most any product using text -- blogging service, email client, instant messenger or online community, among many others. None of these products require a separate, dedicated wordprocessor, with Microsoft's Outlook being one of very few exceptions (and there is a longstanding bug -- hopefully not a feature -- that sends attachments to non-Outlook clients as unusable DAT files).

The majority of content people produce today is either textual, using features already part of the aforementioned products, or audiovisual. For example, the PowerPoint of the 2000s is the Web-hosted photo slideshow. Photos and videos easily top the list of content that most people regularly produce and want to share with others. Music is another, although for most of it there are sticky copyright considerations.

Apple understands and has taken a commanding lead in both consumer and professional markets for digital audio, photo and video content creation. Apple controls an applications stack, too: Final Cut Studio-Mac OS X-Mac OS X Server, and it's hugely popular among people that professionally produce content. There's a smaller application stack, with iLife at the front end.

Microsoft needs to understand how important iLife is to the Mac, and how much more important an iLife-equivalent would be to Windows. The company's recently renamed Windows & Windows Live division is supposed to deliver something during MIX10, which last I checked is scheduled for mid-March. By the way, any Microsoft employee thinking that Windows Live Essentials and iLife are comparable is seriously delusional.

So, I've been pining for Mac OS X because of iLife, which would be hugely useful for my work as a journalist. But something has held me back from giving up Windows 7, and it also is part of the new cloud and content stack Microsoft has failed to adequately embrace: Google Chrome. I confess. I'm a Chrome junkie. The browser is fast, elegant and (seemingly) safe, all without those nagging warnings that make Internet Explorer 7 or 8 a spiteful nuisance (C`mon, you know it's true. Confess!). There's something about the Web and cloud content that is simply better on Chrome, but that's topic for another post.

As the official Chrome for Mac beta approaches -- albeit minus many features -- I find myself considering putting away the VAIO Z720 for the 13-inch MacBook Pro. Yes, I'd give up the simply gorgeous 1600 x 900 LED display, but I could always run Windows 7 and Mac OS on the Apple laptop.

The new application stack is the cloud, and Google gets it perhaps even better than Apple. I've got to wonder, will I be running Chrome OS in 2011? Will you? OK, so it's time for your confession. For what applications do you run either Windows 7 or Snow Leopard?