My Prediction for Secret Microsoft Project

Robert Scoble stunned us today with admission that Microsoft Research project that he saw  behind closed doors, made him cry with joy. But, of course, he can’t tell us what it is, just yet!

What I think we really need from Microsoft now is serious integration of Web Services into Operating System. It is way overdue, seriously! Why can’t I right click an image on my disk and get 3 different options for various things to do with Image via Web Services. Flickr for uploading, Pixenate for online photo editing, and 3rd to blog image directly to your personal blog with some title/description text that you would be asked to add to complete that operation. It should come with neat Control Panel, giving you full control about file types and what Web Services you wish to use for each, even with your personal credentials to relevant online service. Want to convert video? Then simply right click and choose Hey!Watch service, tweak few small settings that popup on your desktop and some minutes later you got your target video converted, with no software or codecs to install. Just think about it, one of the things that is most often causing troubles to your local PC is conflicts between software components, and configuration issues where one program is interfering with another, or worse yet, breaking your OS!

But, instead, I fear they will introduce something like Gesture based input system for Vista Explorer and maybe IE browser. The premise of waving hands in front of your screen is something I predicted many years ago, and as I wrote about recently some startups have made serious progress recently in that area. But, gesture based input is tricky to make useful, although if done right, it can sure be a blast. Still, you’ve got to make sure it’s relevant applications, since there isn’t much use in it for Word Processor or Excel work, probably.

So I hope they unveil the Web Services integration, but if they don’t, I provided the simple specs so get to work Microsoft!