Windows is the is the "standard" desktop OS but you'll find folks who think it's crap.

Of course you will. Some of them will even have reasons that they can articulate. Fewer of them will have reasons that are still a factor that they can articulate. But you can find them :)

There's always the standard standard and then the standard for those who are more enlightened than the masses.

And then there is the reality that for any given thing that is standard there are people who use something else to feel more enlightened and special but have no real reason to do so. It is a fairly common belief among humans that being different makes them special or l33t.

Depressing, isn't it?

Not really. There is a lot to like about IE in my experience... including the speed and lack of huge memory leaks ( even the guys on Slashdot know and discuss the Firefox memory issues and they are religiously pro Firefox ). IE7 is looking very very good and I don't expect IE to lose it's dominance any time soon.

"As to the security issues...they appear to be "all microsoft's problem" because the disgusting criminal hackers only attack IE. Notice how, as soon as Mac went on Intel, the hackers moved in."

"Black Hat" Hacking is about either (1) money (creating a botnet) or (2) gaining fame from your p33rz about your skillz. In both of those circumstances, Windows is the target you want. Of course there are many Linux "rootkits" and a few MacOSX ones... but they won't be reported too widely in some parts of the tech world so that people don't take heat for hurting the war against MS.

It will be amusing to see how it all plays out. I still hear people make "blue screen" jokes YEARS after they have been an issue. They still make "windows is insecure" comments years after SP2 solved most fo that. They will no doubt be equally slow to see the improvements of Vista.

And make no mistake, Vista is good. Really, really good.