The world of computers today is leading... Well, somewhere. ;)
Well, if you look at Memphis, the path that Microsoft's trodding is a path that leads to something more like SoftBox. It's smaller, the programs can interact more, etc. The thing is, that when Microsoft do that in some way, we do it all the way! If it's meaningful that two processes cooperate, in SoftBox they can! And if Memphis is smaller than Win95, SoftBox is tiny!
The development is maybe more clear in the MS Office family. Those programs can cooperate, which was the new thing in Office 95, and then in Office 97 it all got smaller.
So it's pretty clear that the world has realized which way to go, but Microsoft can't make it! They've got too much behind. They've got to think of the backward-compatibility. (Oc, we'll have to do that too, in some degree, 'cause you won't want it unless you can open your Word- or Excel-documents). So, as we see it, SoftBox is what's the world's waiting for!