A few days ago, a Microsoft employee who has worked on Windows 7 and 8 said on a Reddit AMA:

"There is no doubt that we have catching up to do. We even do funny ads acknowledging how bad we were: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lD9FAOPBiDk "

They still know they're not perfect but they seem to think they're good enough already. I hope one day they learn to do things right.

This: http://karaokewebstandard.org/ (from the video) is actually pretty funny.

I wonder if anyone has thought of starting a Github repo of a JS library that follows the pattern defined on the Karaoke Web Standards site? Could be a fun project. Using the plethora of HTML5 API's available, I wonder if you could get close to a working karaoke prototype using HTML5 audio and video API's?

Except that the ad is not funny but lame.

Hah, as a designer I enjoyed that more than I was expecting... It does raise a lot of questions of methodology and bureaucracy.

The Microsoft you speak of is the one that existed a decade ago. It has changed significantly in recent years. Its the one leading the design with skeumorphic layouts. Has some of the coolest products out there. They may not be financial success, but very well designed.

Skeumorphic? I'm not sure the metro-UI tiles have any real-world counterpart.

EDIT: In fact, Andrew Kim himself makes the point for me: http://bit.ly/VfSQ7T

I guess you meant it the other way around: "Its the one leading the design with minimal layouts." E.g. Metro UI.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skeuomorph thats what Apple is famous for, e.g. with their calendar app.

i was at microsoft at the time, and i can confirm this was done inside microsoft by one of it's marketing teams.

i don't remember which team now, but it was shown at one of the company meetings.