I've tried to get worked up about Windows 10, but I can't. Windows 10 is cognitive dissonance hard-coded into a kaleidoscope of tiles and colours. Microsoft is now condemned to make Windows XP forever, tacking on naff ideas along the way. It tried to escape with the bright and frankly bonkers Windows 8 but eventually it had to back down. The people have spoken and they want their bloody Start Menu.
In 1984, when Apple launched the original Macintosh, it vomited into existence a skeuomorphic wonder - the desktop. We could click icons to open folders, in which we could click more icons. Other icons let us open things covered in yet more icons. It is a wonderland we've been stuck in ever since.
Computers are still in their infancy and it is daft to think that operating systems will always look like this. Microsoft's attempt to do things differently in Windows 8 was both massively flawed and universally derided. People want a Recycling Bin and they want a big blank space with no discernable purpose. That's how computers work because Apple said so 20 years ago. We've not come far since.
Announcing Windows 10 you could be forgiven for thinking Microsoft had a fairly high regard for itself. Executive vice president of operating systems Terry Myerson prattled that "Windows has empowered all of us" without a hint of irony. Such bellicose statements have been a hallmark of big tech companies for years, as has marketing prattle. This is another very similar version of Windows - nothing more, nothing less.
Windows 10 has the potential to be a pretty decent operating system. Microsoft is right to plaster the same name across all devices running Windows, it is also right to reintroduce useful features from Windows 7. Changes in design help it look less fusty but Microsoft is still stuck trying to shoehorn mouse, keyboard and touch into one dreaded 'ecosystem'. It is a lousy compromise but one that seemingly we all demanded.
As Steve Jobs once said, only to be quoted for eternity: "People don't know what they want until you show it to them." Windows 10 is the opposite. This is the operating system we all wanted rather than some eureka moment.
There is a pointlessness to Windows 10 similar to the pointlessness of your appendix - you know why its there but that doesn't make it any less redundant. Like it or not we'll all be staring blankly at it for years to come.
