Comment by deaddodo
2 months ago
It’s like they say, only alternating versions of Windows are actually worth using.
It’s almost like they follow a software version of Intel’s old tick-tock pattern. A version that’s super experimental, but unstable and flaky (95, Me, Vista, 8, 11) and a version that irons out the wrinkles to make a solid OS (98, 2000/Xp, 7, 10).
I'm not sure I'd consider Windows Me to be very experimental, except perhaps an experiment in sadism...
However I do love that its Wikipedia article includes the sentence "Retrospectively, Windows Me is viewed as one of the worst operating systems of all time".
Me was very experimental with the audio/video processing pipelines and playback capabilities. Many of those were ported over to the XP.
That being said, even people at the time knew it was mostly a half-hearted experiment and wondered why Microsoft was even moved forward with it. So you're not wrong.
There is a better cycle for this. LTS. You don't force people off LTS until next LTS version has had time to iron out its wrinkles. This is really basic stuff. You'd expect one of the largest companies in the world to at least get the basics.
Problem is, I don’t think it’s a conscious decision by Microsoft. It just happens because they have to make their next versions appealing to buyers with new features.
Supposedly, the longer lifecycles of newer versions with large milestone updates was supposed to help with this, but seems to have just bandaged it over.
And, to be fair, the Apple community makes similar complaints about macOS with alternating releases. Just with far less vitriol (given macOS generally has a higher reputation among those that use it in a power/professional sphere).
The difference I believe was that past failed windows versions were not intentionally bad, they were well intentioned but failed to achieve the goals, with windows 11 it's like they are deliberately making it worse.