"By that, we mean it does not try to emulate faux-industrial design characteristics such as materiality (glass, wood, plastic, etc.)."
Is "materiality" code for "skeumorphism"? Either way, it's a big middle finger to Apple.
Is "materiality" code for "skeumorphism"? Either way, it's a big middle finger to Apple.
That attitude was not unique to them, at all. Apple has been equally guilty of it for longer than Microsoft. It's that attitude that (in part) led me to move to Linux a decade ago, where I could merrily work without suffering the overhead of a GUI.
This new Windows logo is, in my view, the sexiest thing I've ever seen come out of Microsoft. I stopped caring about Windows long ago, except to note that minwin sounded awesome (but never shipped?), Windows 8 Server could run headless (What an innovation!), and PowerShell actually does seem brilliantly innovative (although it's unfortunately integrated with all that .net crap).
Now if this logo accurately reflects their change in attitude, to a minimal OS that stays out of my way, then I've got to say I'm a fan. They're unlikely to win me over from Arch Linux, but for once Microsoft seems to be on the right track. At least with respect to that logo.
Edit: I'm amazed that this post is bouncing between 0 and 1 points. In a discussion of the new Windows logo, I described why I like it so much. If you disagree, feel free to comment. Down-votes should not be used to express disagreement.
I recall reading an article which talked about the kernel team assigning level numbers to every kernel component, giving the GUI a high level processor scheduling and such a low level, and trying to reduce the dependency between the different levels. Minwin was merely a Windows kernel that has none of the higher level components, but the problem with it is that they didn't manage to completely modularize the kernel so that if you would add some new components they would require a slew of other components.
Still, they've managed to make Internet Explorer optional, but I'm not sure what other benefits the modularization of Windows Vista's kernel has brought.
Having said that, I doubt Microsoft is moving in a direction an Arch Linux user would call "minimalist".
Minwin was always just the name of their kernel refactoring project, it was never supposed to be shipped as a separate product.
Good, this echo chamber can be annoying.
One thing that also plagued my Compiz logo is that horizontally asymmetric designs can look like they're about to tip over. The new Windows logo definitely feels like leaning towards left to me. I tried to solve it by adding the third dimension, but I think the answer is more vertical asymmetry.. A real perspective.