![\"Figure](\"http:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Microsoft-ExcelScreenSnapz001.png\")
Figure 1. Various versions of Windows and how much they’re in use today.<\/p><\/div>\n
As you can see, things don’t bode well for Windows 8. In fact, if you include both releases of Windows 8 (the original was well as version 8.1), you get only 12 percent of the Windows users out there using an operating system that’s nearly 2 years old.<\/p>\n
Compare that with Windows XP, which is over 12 years old, and it retains a 31 percent of the Windows market share. That’s huge.<\/p>\n
Obviously, Microsoft is aware of the dismal Windows 8 sales figures. How could they not be? Even if Wikipedia’s data is a complete fabrication generated by seething Linux fanatics, I know from the real world and from the emails I get that few people use Windows 8.<\/p>\n
I don’t have a Windows 8 book, other than the one I published myself, Windows 8 Sucks<\/em>. For my other books, I begged the publisher not<\/em> to label any of them as the “Windows 8 Version.” That would have sunk sales quicker than the iceberg sank the Titanic.<\/p>\n And that thought brings me to Windows 9.<\/p>\n No one knows whether or not Microsoft will dub the next version of Windows as “nien” or not. They may call it Windows Sunflower<\/em> for all I know.<\/p>\n And the rumor mills are quite vague on the topic; apparently Microsoft’s normal leaky channels are pretty tight when it comes to Windows 9.<\/p>\n What is generally known is this:<\/p>\n • Microsoft definitely doesn’t want to screw up Windows 9. If they do, they realize that Windows is dead as an operating system. Users will rally around XP or Win 7 and use them exclusively (imagine the black market) or they’ll migrate to Linux or OS X.<\/p>\n • No word on whether Microsoft will kill the Metro interface. I hope they do; a PC is not a tablet. Apple understands this fact.<\/p>\n