The start of the year is always a good time for looking into the crystal ball. But this time around I’ll forgo the usual prognostications. Instead, here are my predictions for five things Microsoft won’t do in 2005 - but should.

Microsoft Advises People to Switch to Firefox

Microsoft surprises the world by telling users to switch to Firefox. “We’ve given up modernizing Internet Explorer or beefing up its security,” a Microsoft official admitted. “So we figured, what the heck, let’s tell people to go with the best browser out there. After all, who cares about installed base?”

Microsoft Introduces Plain-English Error Codes

Abandoning decades of tradition, Microsoft uses error codes that humans can understand. Henceforth, Windows error codes will no longer say things such as “System Error Code %ld”!” Instead, they’ll be in the kind of everyday English that people use. The most common error code will read: “Dude, your PC’s hosed!”

Microsoft Releases an iPod Killer

Microsoft rolls out a beautifully designed digital music player with more capacity than the iPod and with a slicker, more elegant look. An even bigger surprise: It doesn’t try to cram Windows onto the small LCD screen. “Who says Windows has to be everywhere?” explained a Microsoft spokesman. “Sometimes it just doesn’t fit.”

Microsoft Beefs up its Anemic Firewall

Microsoft finally adds outbound protection to its Windows Firewall, a kind of protection every other firewall has, and that it inexplicably didn’t bother to include in SP2. An unnamed Microsoft employee admits that outbound protection “just kind of slipped our mind. Who thought you’d need to worry about Trojans, bots, and spyware?”

Microsoft Rolls Out Longhorn

On February 1, at a small event attended only by half-a-dozen people, Microsoft releases the final version of Longhorn, with its full feature set. “All those times we told you it was delayed, and that we had to strip it down - we were just pulling your leg,” Bill Gates told the small group, who were sipping generic cola out of paper cups and munching on Doritos, the only food provided at the low-key event. When asked why he had made the announcement so quietly, and had forgone the usual several hundred million dollar marketing campaign to launch a new operating system, Gates answered, “Publicity, schmublicity. A product should sell itself. Who needs hype?”

What are your predictions for things Microsoft won’t do in 2005, but should?