BOOM :)

I think www.skycms.net system has an interesting UI (you have to register to see it though) :(

It might be because ie9+ are cool browsers, I use it as my primary!

Lets be original.. Win "smooth" Metro - after the new UI

ie is always my preferred web browser. To me all the others feel basic and un-intuative, especially when it comes to navigating and using my favourites and history (which I have permanently pinned to my side). I have all the others on my system as I'm a web developer but in my view having tried the others for ages I keep coming back to ie. and use the others for testing.

Serious answer: cheese on toast please. Here are a couple of points.. .net is a powerful standardized environment. .net enforces a standard of programming in itself. It is availible to the masses. Development uses less code so you can get stuff done quicker - this is the advantage of having something on top/runtime. Easy cross-platform developmnent, for me: web , phone, desktop, cloud (Azure) all in c#. If your website is written in .net 2.0 you can, at the click of a button upgrade it to and take advantage of new powerful features that are available using a few lines of code such as AJAX with .net 3.5, Multi-threading with .net 4.0. etc. The system is upgradeable. Everyone knows a .net developer meaning that your code can be supported. ..there are many more, of course: Visual Studio is king to use.

I Just wanted to say that ive just picked up my WP7 and am awe-inspired by the slickness and real usability focus. Very impressed as i manage 25 emails accounts through hotmail (5 on each account, using folders as account catch-alls) and it allows me to check them all at a few glances, you could say it's easier than hotmail itself. Very slick, the o2 colour scheme with a white background looks superb, duper thumbs up, if i wasn't before, this has turned me into MicrosoftFaNBoY #1!

Subjective, Schnubjective. Of course you can replace the above text. I was sharing what I see as fact in my environment. Appreciated comments!

He then donated a large-fortune to charity. Happy birthday Bill!

Just another point, every time I try and use open source software to develop an app, I end up having to pay more than if I had developed it in MS platform to remove e.g. the open source logo or license it for my web-app. On multiple occasions open source has made my life difficult/more expensive in this respect. The open source software I use always seems to get bought out by a larger software company. MS seems to me to be the only platform that I can provide a business-class solution without any comebacks like this.

I am a Microsoft developer, and have been for 15 years because MS have always made it easy for me to do my job - develop great apps within a familiar environment, while enabling other developers to understand my work and get the support I need, when I need it. I have always found myself in extremely high demand especially in the larger corps such as banking in London. I, along with collegues like our systems running on MS solutions as they are the best all-in-one for what we need. .net offers a forced, high standard model of programming. How to deal with it: learn another programming language and earn less money and implement solutions that cost less or move on and earn more money, providing better solutions where you are appreciated as an MS developer. I believe the anti-MS thing is for those who can't afford MS, you pay for what you get in this world, they don't know what they are missing.

...you read this.