IN YET ANOTHER announcement calculated to revolutionize the computer world, Microsoft has debuted its new XP operating system.

While his heart no doubt stayed in Seattle, Microsoft boss himself Bill Gates was hanging out in the Big Apple last week with Mayor Rudy Giuliani, proclaiming “the end of the MS-DOS era” (MS-DOS is the original Microsoft operating system—you know, the one that allowed Gates to build a house roughly the size of the University of Washington). Although observers think XP could fuel still-blazing disputes between Microsoft and federal regulators, Gates isn’t worried. At a New York dinner, the Microsoft chairman commented mostly on “the injustice and the irony” of past court rulings, according to New York Times tech writer Steve Lohr.

On the downside, XP didn’t get a rockin’ theme song like Windows (whose 1995 launch soundtrack was the Rolling Stones’ “Start Me Up”); Microsoft will instead serenade potential purchasers with Madonna’s “Ray of Light.”

James Bush jbush@seattleweekly.com