But are those opinions justified?Īs it turns out, there is a nearly perfect test case we can use to compare the two companies’ approaches to user interface design. Mac users have heaped scorn on Microsoft’s decision to adopt the ribbon throughout Windows 8, saying they prefer Apple’s “simple and elegant” user interface designs. That widespread lack of recent experience makes the recent debate over Microsoft’s Windows 8 interface choices even more muddled.
Most Mac switchers hear “Windows” and visualize the interfaces from whatever versions of Windows and Office they used before they switched-usually Windows XP and Office 2003-that have been radically overhauled.
They get to compare their modern Apple experience with the memory of a Microsoft product they literally rejected, and naturally they prefer the present. Even worse, the millions of Mac users who switched in the past few years have only distant (and probably painful) memories of old Microsoft products. The overwhelming majority of Windows users have no hands-on experience with a Mac. Among PC and Mac users worldwide, most use one platform regularly and rarely if ever use the other. The trouble is, most people don’t have enough experience to back those opinions up. Everyone has an opinion about user interfaces.
