Windows brings out the Rorschach test in everyone

(devblogs.microsoft.com)

111 points | by luu 2 hours ago ago

41 comments

  • stefs 19 minutes ago

    years ago my father got a decomissioned, wiped clean notebook from work and asked me to set it up for him. i didn't want to shell out a hundred bucks for windows, so i suggested trying linux (ubuntu) and he agreed. "intrepid ibex" was installed without issues. a few weeks later i asked him if everything was ok and how he liked it, and he had no complaints, except one: he didn't like the edgy skull on the desktop wallpaper: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_version_history#/media/...

    • st_goliath 9 minutes ago

      > "intrepid ibex" ... edgy skull on the desktop wallpaper

      Ah, that would be 8.10 with the coffee stain wallpaper :-P

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ubuntu_screenshot.png

    • SV_BubbleTime 13 minutes ago

      The most shocking thing for me on this was that Ivex was such a shit version of Linux and gave me such trouble I put Linux off for 10 more years after that crap. It was not at all ready for normal people. Night and day different to Linux today.

    • sneak 7 minutes ago

      https://massgrave.dev/

      Windows has been free since at least VXKC4. Microsoft wouldn’t exist as anything but an Excel vendor today if it were any other way; it’s intentional.

      (Ubuntu was the right choice.)

  • mrosenbjerg an hour ago

    Raymond Chen is my favorite MS blog writer

  • yreg an hour ago

    This article includes the photo of the (clothed) hologram (it's the third image).

    https://hardcoresoftware.learningbyshipping.com/p/038-design...

  • ttyyzz 23 minutes ago

    I must say that "But it makes me wonder about the mental state of our beta testers [...]"

    cought me off guard while drinking coffee

    • wolfi1 15 minutes ago

      is the screen still usable?

  • sachahjkl 2 minutes ago

    satanic

  • khazhoux 4 minutes ago

    This is why large companies should employ a few pedophiles to run things like this by them first. Long term, much savings.

    • walrus01 2 minutes ago

      Or they could outsource it via some kind of API: EaaS (Epstein As A Service)

  • jck86 an hour ago

    Red Moon Desert is now my wallpaper for the rest of the week.

    Looking at it from a distance indeed may raise some brows.

    • fluoridation an hour ago

      Someone has to accept that they're looking at the flattest pair of cheeks ever to interpret that as an ass.

  • pelagicAustral 15 minutes ago

    They should have told them to gtfo and use Slackware then.

  • teekert an hour ago

    Another example: [0]

    Have to say this never would have occurred to me. There are also examples of US people being offended by scenes considered harmless in other cultures, ie the Totoro bathtub scene [1], search for "family bathing scene".

    I guess if this hologram offended people, there must be some nice stories about Nirvana's Nevermind (1991).

    [0] https://velvetshark.com/ai-company-logos-that-look-like-butt...

    [1] https://uk.movies.yahoo.com/my-neighbour-totoro-10-things-di...

    • walrus01 14 minutes ago

      > Sound familiar? It should, because it's also an apt description of... well, you know. A butthole.

      Good news! Cornholio.ai isn't registered by anyone as a domain name, so someone with sufficient motivation and a love for Beavis and Butthead could totally instruct an LLM to make a satirical AI-butthole-logo themed website.

      Bonus points if it has affiliate links to Amazon or other online stores selling TP (for the bunghole, of course).

    • croes 18 minutes ago
    • skeaker an hour ago

      Hmm. I gotta say I do see these though. Especially Claude...

    • rsynnott 26 minutes ago

      I refuse to believe that at this point the AI companies are not doing that deliberately.

      • lopis 18 minutes ago

        You can just as well say the logos look like flowers, suns, plasma balls, retinas. If you choose to only see anuses on all of them, that's really on you.

  • docdeek an hour ago

    [2003]

    • pizzaiolo an hour ago

      That's how far back Windows needs to go to try to elicit some non-negative attention

      • Tallain 39 minutes ago

        I mean, Raymond Chen has been writing The Old New Thing consistently for over 20 years. Nearly every single entry is interesting, informative, and illuminating, aimed at every facet of software engineering, old and new, over the decades. He may be part of the final bastion of quality and care for detail at MS, dwindling and faint as it is.

        Windows doesn't need or deserve defending. It's atrocious. But this is a silly comment.

        • navigate8310 33 minutes ago

          I don't think OP meant any non-negative reaction towards Raymond but MSFT.

  • sneak 9 minutes ago

    What is an “obscene body part”?

    If this body part is obscene, shouldn’t the author do the moral thing and remove his own?

  • artisinal 18 minutes ago

    How do I view the collectors edition Windows XP without Googling “naked baby” ?

    Did this comment already put me on a list?

  • wartywhoa23 26 minutes ago

    > Until we got a complaint from a government (who shall remain nameless for obvious reasons) that was upset with Windows 95 because it depicted naked children.

    How dare you violate the government's exclusive right to naked children!

  • kleiba2 an hour ago

    The same government should sue all new mothers: how dare they deliver babies into this world completely naked!!!

    • reddalo 23 minutes ago

      They better not visit Germany, where nudity -- even in some public spaces -- is considered normal! How dare they!!!

      • eru 8 minutes ago

        'Some public spaces' is underselling the prevalence of FKK a bit.

  • jb1991 an hour ago

    So what was the government that complained?

  • lukasbm an hour ago

    Why should the govt remain nameless?

    • ketzu 44 minutes ago

      For the same reason they acted on the complaint and changed the hologram. It would be bad for business.

      I also think it would be very impolite to make fun of your clients on the internet for a stupid request while naming them explicitly while doing so.

  • OuterVale an hour ago

    Users scare me.