R.I.P. … Chat? (Premium)

Windows enthusiasts have spent the better part of two years complaining about the many functional regressions in Windows 11. But there are things to like about it too, including most obviously the prettier, more modern user interface. Oddly, those two extremes are often linked. That is, those functional regressions were literally caused by Microsoft moving to a simpler new user interface. It's a paradox.

But the simpler new UI isn't the only example of this uniquely Microsoft problem. In writing and updating the Windows 11 Field Guide over the past several months, I've come across similar issues throughout the system. And one of them was problematic enough that I did what I so often do and procrastinated by not writing about it.

That feature is Chat, which is a Taskbar-based front-end for the consumer version of Microsoft Teams that Microsoft also bundles with Windows 11. Like the new UI, Chat is also a paradox. And Chat is now going away, as we noted in passing in our post about a new Windows 11 Insider Preview build for the Dev channel. Chances are you think that that's all the attention this silly little app deserves. But let's pause for a moment to reconsider. While there's still time.

Chat fits into a small bucket of Windows features that evolved from similar Windows 10 features that were renamed or otherwise changed. Widgets is another example: Widgets in Windows 11 is an evolution of a Windows 10 feature called News and Interests, and in the new system it is more prominent and finally starting to expand past the feature set offered by its predecessor. Chat in Windows 11, likewise, is an evolution of a Windows 10 feature called Meet Now. As with Widgets, it is more prominent than its predecessor---it's a Taskbar item that's pinned and available by default instead of a tiny system tray icon---and it has evolved to be more functional than its predecessor over time as well.

Chat is also a lot more nuanced than Widgets. A lot more.

Meet Now was a well-intentioned pandemic-era attempt by Microsoft to put Skype's free video calling functionality front and center on the PCs we were suddenly using all day long so we could work from home. But it arrived about six months too late---early 2021 instead of mid-2020---and Microsoft by that time was already dropping Skype like a bad habit so it could focus on Microsoft Teams. I won't claim that any of that contributed to the rise of Zoom during the pandemic, but it didn't help.

Anyway, when Windows 11 was first announced in mid-2021, Chat was one of its marquee new features. Like Meet Now, it would let users engage in free video calls right from the Windows Taskbar, plus text chats and audio calls, of course. But this time it would not be powered by Skype. No, Chat would be powered by Teams.

Well, not really: Chat is powered by a special consumer version of Teams that is not the same thing as the Teams everyone uses for work. It has exactly the same name, which is beyond...