Please check with your local community college

So, get this. Bill Gates is giving his keynote speech at PDC 2005. During this keynote speech he's talking about all the uninteresting features for the long over-due update to Windows, and on top of that, he's showing off GUI features that got my pants wet back in 1999. Yeah, I said it. I'm not going to get started on how Windows Vista is going to be the most boring thing to happen in 2006 (MS still has time to put my foot in my mouth for me). But I will get started on this new version of Office with an overhaul done to the GUI. You know, I thought they would simplify it for us. I thought they would get rid of the buttons we don't need and you could add them later. I thought I thought I thought I thought wrong. The new GUI looks horrible. But what could I expect; it matches the horrible Vista GUI. I understand the principle behind it. You click the WRITE tab and it brings up all the tools you would need to write a document. Don't get me wrong, I think the ribbon idea is swell, but does it need to take up that much screen space? Does the binocular icon for the find function need to be life size binoculars? After scouring this great tool known as the internet, I found the best quote that sums up my feelings for it. It's short and to the point.

It looks like ass.

So please Microsoft. Send your GUI developers to a graphic design class or two. Do whatever it takes to get this thing to look sexy and functional. Thank God for my 19in monitor running at blazin' high resolution. NOTE: I am totally aware that these programs are still in development and that they can change. From past experience, whatever MS showed off at their conferences is what went final.