It's the morning after. I've woken up beside Windows 11, and, frankly, it doesn't look all that attractive anymore.
What I'm saying is, I don't agree with the fuss over the new OS, even as someone whose primary job here is to discuss Microsoft news on a site with Windows in the name. The operating system is, as an industry analyst whom I spoke with yesterday called it, a "marketing moment" for Microsoft. From where I'm sitting, it's nothing more than a mild facelift that is being used as an excuse to draft the media into manufacturing consumer interest.
The year is 2021. We have cryptocurrencies named after cartoon dogs ravaging economies, global superpowers affecting worldwide search engine results, billionaires who subject us all to annual Prime Days blasting off into space on personal rocketships — and people are losing sleep over a dinky operating system's Start menu aesthetics? Are you serious?
Let's all just calm down
Windows 11 will not change much of anything for the vast majority of users. You will still be able to quickly boot up your machine, open a browser, and watch porn. Nothing of value will be altered for 99% of the people set to use Windows 11 in the near future.
Oh, but Skype is being ditched in favor of native Microsoft Teams integration! That'll change everything! ... Except for, it won't. It's another Microsoft product that'll let you call people to talk about brunch plans. A slightly different interface is not going to unravel the yarn that ties our society together.
That sums up the entirety of Windows 11 at the moment, as far as I'm concerned. A few tweaks to its style and functionality do not warrant changing the name from Windows 10, similar to how going to the salon to spruce up your look does not warrant changing your legal name and address.
The most exhausting OS reveal
Is there anything more perplexing than people screaming, like tweens at a K-pop concert, over the concept of rounded edges? Can any other software (outside of anything Apple churns out) garner so much attention for such minutia?
It's also amazing, and life-essence draining, thinking about how Microsoft's more personal, "user-focused" presentation positioned Windows 11 as some sort of essential core to a healthy consumer's life. It's just noise. This Windows will serve the same userbase as all the Windows before it. It will neither increase nor decrease Microsoft's relevance in your daily life. And yet, scripted advertising talking points have positioned this product as the second heart that humans didn't know they needed to function properly.
In short: The Windows 11 marketing machine hasn't quite sunk its teeth into me, at least not in a way that benefits the boys in Redmond. I implore you to leave comments, though. I'm not going to ask you to change my mind since that's a pretty narcissistic thing to request, but if you feel you can inject the Microsoft-branded thunder into my veins, by all means, fire away.
