I do think the hate is overblown and a little immature. Maybe it felt a little silly if you were already a computer expert in 1995, or just hated Microsoft in general as was en vogue at the time, but the character served an important purpose. The Microsoft Office suite was huge, could be overwhelming, and still came with 20 pounds of printed manuals. Was the average user ever likely to discover the Letter Wizard or the Party Invitation Template? Clippy did do some analysis of the document you were typing and make some helpful suggestions to guide a new user around the program. And you could turn it off.

Personally I will go to bat for Clippy and don’t think he deserves the derision.