It is never really "too late" as Microsoft could come up with something completely new and awesome just like anyone else. The article mostly talks about Windows 8 and certainly the tablets for Win8 may not be a hit, but that doesn't mean Microsoft can't come up with some new, brilliant idea out of no where that is not on anybody's radar yet. I agree in the short term things are not looking good for them, but as much as people rail on Microsoft, they do have a lot of smart people and they will carve out their part of the market one way or another.
Your formula sort of contradicts itself. When you talk about increasing the number of people who are aware of your passion, you are really talking about increasing your statistical probability that you will find someone that helps you. Therefore, what you are talking about is not luck at all but rather just math.
Luck would be something like Passion * number of times you spin in a circle before falling over dizzy.
Regardless, I like the premise of your article as I think you are right that good things do come to the passionate people that manage to get a lot of people on their side. That is sort of the Keith Ferrazzi mindset of how important relationships are to success.
Man, Groupon really messed things up. They have a large group of devoted fans and they just got too greedy and stupid with the way they handled this IPO. They should have done the IPO a yeah ago without any shananagins and they would have been better off.