Why Windows is such a success

I have devoted a full blog post here to all things I hate about Windows, and it is growing. However, it is impossible to deny the huge success the operating system has had on the desktop. And I think I just realized how this came about. It is really one key thing they realized:
Distribute self-contained binaries and keep binary compatibility.
I think this is the genius move that *NIX did not understand, and still does not.