The Ribbon UI that comes with Microsoft Office 2007 and beyond has become very "popular" to people. I place the word "popular" in quotes because, in reality, it is quite misleading, and many companies who use this UI design in their programs do so without first seeing how many features their programs have, and what their programs do; as a result, it's the end-users who suffer digging through tabs just to find the features they really need.
On one hand, it does a good job of placing the most frequently-used items at the front and in "big" size, while less-used items appear in smaller icons or in their dialog boxes; on the other hand, it will be a pain for the user who is accustomed to the classic design of toolbars and menus; such a user will have to find which category a particular command falls under, and it is not a suitable UI paradigm if your program does not contain a ton-load of features, or if keyboard shortcuts are an extensive requirement, such as in programs for troubleshooting programmable-logic controllers.
It may be apparent that the UI design of the Ribbon was overly emphasized for novice users; in fact, the MS Office user base has more people very proficient at it (the old ones with menus, that is) than novice users; hence, widespread backlash ensued on the new UI of MS Office. Besides, the glow on the Ribbon and its large icons are a no-no for graphics editing and computers with a limited color palette - say, 16bpp or low screen resolution.
Anyway, in any case, whether a program's UI will live on or die off is a matter of personal opinion and preference.
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