#design lessons

You have to understand that I was upgrading from XP at this point.  I'd used Windows 7, but XP did what I needed it to do (actually, I was using Ubuntu more than XP) and I had never got around to upgrading.  When I switched to Windows 8, it actually became my main OS and I didn't regret it, despite its flaws.

That was until earlier this week, anyway...

Most of you will not know about this, but the Windows trial was until January 2013 (i.e. now) and that means inducing you to buy it.  I assumed it would be an all-or-nothing thing or a nag screen, but the truth is more annoying; Windows 8 reboots every two hours until you buy a licence.

Now, you may say that even getting two hours' functionality is good.  After all, it's free!  They have no obligation to offer anything, so why complain?  The answer is that I'm not; I'm saying that they shot themselves in the foot because they broke Windows.

The screen turns blue and flashes 'Windows has encountered an error and must close' or something similar, then restarts.

I had seen the 'Windows will shut down every two hours' message, but still thought Windows had crashed the first time it happened.  It even said it had crashed!  Suddenly, it's a broken operating system.  I knew it would work fine after I'd paid for it, but my most recent memories of Windows 8 would be of random crashes just when I was in the middle of something (nothing new for Windows users) and demands for money.  I almost reinstalled Windows XP, out of irritation.

The same concept applies to games though.  If a game kicks you out entirely after the trial period and tells you how to reactivate, you have a choice whether to do that or not.  Importantly though, your last memory of playing the game is of a fully-functional game.

If, on the other hand, you are allowed to keep playing a functionally-impaired game though, you remember a broken game.  I don't care how much fun you had before it was crippled, it's human nature to remember failures more clearly than successes and recent events more clearly than more distant ones.  If you combine this (so all the memories of good software are older than the ones of broken software) then you are doing yourself a great disservice.