Are the Modern App guidelines the problem with the Modern environment?

Question

I spotted some interesting data yesterday. Not surprisingly, Modern apps are not very popular on desktop PC's.
What was surprising was that the number one app on Windows 8 (defined as "engaging") is the Yahoo Mail app. The article explains the reason is that the app does NOT conform to Microsoft's Modern app guidelines and instead gives desktop customers
an easy to use interface.
As someone who has yet to find a Modern app version of anything I would rather use on my desktop than a desktop version, I wonder if a large part of the problem (getting Modern apps to have some traction on desktop PC's) is the guidelines themselves, which
are clearly oriented toward tablets and essentially ignore desktop users with large monitors.
article: report

Answer 1

That just about sums it up, Mr_bigworlds.  :-)
Many people crave a tablet to play with.  To watch movies on while on the plane to the executive summit, and of course to play Angry Birds on Saturn.
Many people would like their boss/wife to believe they can (or would) do serious work on such a toy.
It's like being a kid again.  Maybe if everyone says they can get real work done on these toys the bosses and wives will start believing the BS just a little, and you can have one to play with.  Until you're laid off.
It's the very nature of the oversimplification that makes the Metro/Modern toy side not useful as compared to the desktop for serious, complex work.  Big font = small productivity.  Pushing so little information around on the screen is
simply not valuable.  The real world is more complicated than what can be fit on the screen in a 24 point font.
If you think you'd like a larger monitor (or several of them), you're probably a "desktop" user and data producer (or a serious gamer).
If you have always set your desktop to 150% size and maximize your window for everything you do because it's just easier to deal with that way, you're probably more a "Metro/Modern" user and data consumer.
Microsoft should have had the smarts to make strides on
both sides for Windows 8, introducing the new "toy" interface, supported by the App Store, while making the desktop better TOO - instead of trying to herd people off the desktop while there's no reasonable alternative on "the
other side".
-Noel
Detailed how-to in my eBooks:  
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