Vista Ultimate Extras: the proles are restless…
Will Head writes…
How do you sell a top of the range edition of a new operating system? Well, Microsoft thought it wasn’t enough to just ram it full of features and add-ons – that was just way too boring. What it did instead was decide to create the operating system that just keeps on giving and Windows Ultimate Extras was born.
The theory was if you bought Ultimate, instead of one of the other cheaper version, you would get new apps and programs exclusively to download. Except the only problem is, after an initial flurry of activity around launch time, new Extras have been a little thin on the ground.
To make matters worse for Microsoft, people are starting to notice and they’re getting a little tetchy about the situation.
Josh Phillips over at Windows Connected kicked off the discussion by asking: “So what is up guys, have you gone on an extended vacation? Are we not going to see any more Extras? Is Microsoft out of ideas for what to offer? Anyone else disappointed in this so far?”
Turns out there were other disappointed folk out there. Long Zheng at istartedsomething had actually been saving up a post ready to hit on 30 June which he reckons would have been the half-year anniversary of Windows Vista (although I only make it 5 months).
“[In February] In a post titled “Is Windows Vista Ultimate Extras a sham?“, I voiced some of my concerns about Ultimate Extras and why I thought it was going to disappoint. A lot of people didn’t agree with me, suggesting we needed more time to allow ‘progress’ to happen. Well, I think now is a better time than any,” Zheng wrote.
Even the official Windows Ultimate blog hasn’t been updated since March – maybe they can’t find it? It took me four goes to get there, cycling through various combinations of Windows, Vista and Ultimate to find the one that wasn’t a spam trap.
Looks like Microsoft has learned the hard way that if you promise something, you must deliver. And in these bloggy times, it only takes a couple of protestors to stir up the troops before everyone starts screaming for their Extras.
