Yay! MS is dying! My guess is that Palladium is their last chance to live, let alone have a future 8 years from now, so they are putting all their efforts into the big P.
They may be in so much trouble that Palladium just won't succeed in time. There is still the risk of them succeeding. So, if everyone interupts the Palladium launch somehow, MS is doomed.
Wow, can you believe the MS saga is playing out like an epic story about an evil empire? So the final battle will take place in 2004 no doubt. They will either win, or lose. If they look much worse in that year, we would know for sure that they lost.
BTW, when will Palladium be started?