I've long since held the view that .net is Microsoft's play for absolute survival - never mind sustaining its dominance - in the face of the tech real estate shift from Windows PC desktop apps, the territory in which they are numero uno, to the Web where they are very notably not numero uno.

In other words, .net is their attempt - by brute force - to recontextualise what they do - which is very considerably operating system and office app flavoured - and carry that brand value and equity into a Web context and hopefully for them, take their developers and market shares with them. But thus far it's been quite hard to pinpoint or articulate, with any real precision or certainty, what Microsoft would actually find itself competing with on this vague and fuzzy Web plaftorm, such is the degree of thinking out-of-the-boxness this concept requires to resolve in one's mind.

But this thread of an emerging story seems like a very, very interesting place to start.