Apple aims to make Windows 7 its new whipping boy

Apple has provided a glimpse of how it plans to treat the launch of rival Microsoft’s Windows 7 operating system this fall.
In short, expect Apple to closely link the new Windows 7 to its much maligned predecessor, the current generation Windows Vista.
Apple has gotten a lot of mileage out of its long-running ad campaign that points out flaws with Windows computers while highlighting the benefits of its own Macintosh computers. Apple launched its “I’m a Mac. I’m a PC” commercials in May 2006. (See Wikipedia entry on Apple’s “Get a Mac” ad campaign.)
At Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday, Bertrand Serlet, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, said Windows 7 is “just another version of Vista.”
Apple used the event to tout its latest Macintosh operating system, Mac OS X Snow Leopard, due out in September. Microsoft’s Windows 7 is set for release Oct. 22.
Windows 7 has the same complexity of Windows Vista, Serlet said.
“Microsoft has dug quite a big hole for itself with Vista,” Serlet said. “And they’re trying to get out of it with Windows 7. But underlying Windows 7 you have the same old technologies.”
He noted such Windows problem areas as DLLs, the registry, disk defragmentation and the user account control.
So expect to see more of actors Justin Long (“Hello, I’m a Mac.”) and John Hodgman (“And I’m a PC.”) in advertisements this fall.