Windows 8 Was My Fault

While you may think I'm joking, I was indirectly responsible for a key member of the Windows 8 user experience team getting a job at Microsoft years earlier. Yep. Windows 8 was my fault.

I'm not sure if I should name names here, and I'd appreciate it if you guys wouldn't speculate in the comments. My point isn't to embarrass anyone, but is rather to amuse.

The story goes like this.

Just ahead of Build 2005, I was contacted by a lead program manager on the Office team who wanted to meet with me privately at the show. We did so, and this person showed off the coming ribbon-based UI that Microsoft would ship in Office 2007 in the next year. At that time, the ribbon was still being designed, so all of the icons were solid shapes, and I was more taken by the tab-based design than by the overall look of what we'd come to know as the ribbon. It just seemed like a tab-based toolbar at the time.

I asked him/her why they were showing me this design early. He/she replied that they owed their job at Microsoft to a tip I had posted years earlier. Basically, the first version of Microsoft Outlook---Outlook 97---was a great MAPI (Microsoft-style) email client, but it didn't handle Internet email very well. So this person wrote an add-on that enabled more sophisticated handling of Internet email. I recommended the add-on in my email newsletter, where someone on the Outlook team found out about it and decided to find and hire the person responsible.

Nice, I thought. I was super-impressed by the ribbon, and was happy for this person's success and that they were making such a positive change at Office. And off we went.

A few years later, Steven Sinofsky, who had been leading Office development, was handed the reigns of Windows after the Vista disaster. And he naturally brought along several of his key lieutenants, including Julie Larson-Green ... and the person who had showed me the early ribbon demo.

Their first task was to right the Windows ship, and the resulting product---Windows 7---was very well received. But once that simple job was completed, the new Windows team set off to reimagine Windows in a way that was even more radical than what they had done previously with the Office ribbon.

The result, of course, was Windows 8. And my friend had played a key role in its design, and had been given the same carte blanche that Mr. Sinofsky had previously provided to this team in Office. This time with less successful results.

So can see where this is going. Windows 8 was my fault.

Sorry about that.

 

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