The Windows Store is seemingly innocuous but could just be the first step towards giving MS more control over the PC market. For example, they could require that any applications designed for Windows be made available on the Windows Store.
Yeah there's nothing innocuous about the Windows Store. Microsoft controls it and judging by their heavy hand with the XBL platform we're all in for a bumpy ride. It's a huge land grab, they are trying to force adoption of the platform because they fucked up in the mobile markets several times. So to shortcut their way to competition they are trying to push desktop users onto a larger overall platform where they can leverage them into other segments. There's a reason they are removing boot to desktop code (they know pc folks will setup casual computers that way) and under pinned Metro into everything. You connect a monitor and get Metro side panels. Want to restart the PC? Metro. Miss the close button by a pixel or two? Metro charms bar. Left side? Metro task manager. Change file assocations? Metro. You simply can't get away from it which is why the folks who think Start 8 will solve their woes confuse me, they don't even seem to have used Windows 8 and fully appreciate what's going on.