It will be interesting to see what happens with Macromedia whose announced there intention to expand Flash into a full platform for rich client software development. (more details) Don't be mistaken this is a frontal attack and Microsoft has already registered the potential threat to their platform. If Macromedia gains any traction watch for the sleeping giant to wake and start f*cking thing up.
So how will Microsoft respond? We'll they could just buy Macromedia (there were rumors about this in the past), or just develop the own vector based UI format and animation apps and it looks like this is what they're doing. At the last CHI conference Microsoft recruiters were looking for PMs to staff a new app to make it easy to create lick-able interfaces in Visual Studio. I think they'll do well with the traditional VB/C# developers, but they may find courting the graphic designer audience more elusive. At CHI they kept talking the technical ceiling in Flash and how they wanted to make it much more powerful. I hope Microsoft hasn't forgotten about the power that comes from making things easier and more accessible.
[ Micah Alpern ]
Given the fact that Flash 6 is a pre-requisite for the Office 2003 B2 install, I would venture to guess that Microsoft would be more likely to buy and/or partner with Macromedia than they are to try to compete in that space.
That pre-requisite is quite curious if you ask me. Why would anything in Office be dependent on Flash? Maybe someone out there can shed some light on this one...