I keep getting hi-five'd for commenting on Microsoft being irrelevant.
Do you need to support their platform and partner with them?
Probably.
Are they the future?
No.
Sony writes a lot of software, but do you really care?
No.
They are not the future, especially concerning software (and I would argue that Sony is non-innovator in home and personal electronics as well).
Microsoft is in the same boat. You are going to buy an X-Box, but are you really going to care about the rest of what they are doing? No.
As for the the game market is pretty fickle, so you might not even care there long term. As a non-gamer the only thing which has captured my attention in the gaming industry in recent time has been the WII.
So do I watch what Microsoft does?
Sure, it is inevitable just because of their size.
But what do I think of it?
Irrelevant.