Comment by k-mcgrady

I was surprised to read this. I assumed that Windows 8 only contained the 'desktop' to give developers time to convert their apps to work on metro and that Microsoft would deprecate the desktop in Windows 9 or 10. If they did do that Windows would become a closed platform. With this restriction in Windows 8 Windows is seemingly more closed than OS X. Apple restricts certain features like iCloud to App Store apps but restricting apps from using the main UI on your OS is another matter.