Please, Microsoft, for the love of Windows

Up until Windows 8 was released to manufacturing on Aug. 15, I held out a slim hope that Microsoft would do the right thing: Make the interface tentatively known as Metro optional and bring back the Start menu. Obviously, that didn’t happen. So I have a simple message for Microsoft:

Metro is just fine on a tablet. Metro is very nice on a smartphone, as long as you don’t have a ton of apps. But Metro never, ever belonged on a desktop or laptop screen. No way. Uh-uh. What were you thinking?

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Microsoft, you need to let desktop and laptop users get rid of Metro and you need to restore our old friend the Start menu. I know, I know, you’ve moved on. But it needs to come back. You don’t even need to bring it back yourself. Just restore the APIs in the Preview version of Windows 8 that allowed third parties to write utilities that re-create the Start menu.

That’s it! Two easy requests. No nits to pick — just those two things. In fact, not just me, but some of your staunchest supporters figured you would relent and take those two painfully obvious steps before you released the final version.

Yes, I know you want everyone to move to Metro, and you figured shoving it in the desktop/laptop user’s face is the way to do that. But admit it: You made a mistake. On the bright side, it should be easy to fix. You might even be able to roll it into Windows 8 SP1.

I realize the chances you will listen to me are … not good. But I know you guys love to collect data about Windows usage patterns. When the multitudes run away in horror from desktops and laptops running Windows 8, you will have lots and lots of data to play with. And it’s not going to be pretty. There won’t be a pony in there.

Now, I know what you’re going to say: People can keep buying Windows 7 retail for a year after Windows 8 ships and for at least two years preloaded on hardware by PC makers. If people don’t like Windows 8, they don’t have to get it, at least not for a long while.

But I have a couple of problems with that. One is that there are some very attractive enhancements in Windows 8 that have nothing to do with Metro. I asked Woody Leonhard, who wrote the definitive InfoWorld review of Windows 8 along with the forthcoming “Windows 8 All-in-One for Dummies” book about those improvements. Here’s his response:

Top desktop enhancements to Win8? There are many! Really, if it weren’t for the damn propensity to flip out to Metro from time to time, I’d be happy with using Win8 with a mouse. Just off the top of my head: world-class integrated antivirus, UEFI support and signed OS binaries (the Linux folks hate it, but I think it’s tremendous), greatly improved wireless networking, new Task Manager, Do Not Track in IE, better sandboxing in IE 10 (which may run in Win7 — we still don’t know), roaming user profiles for Microsoft accounts, Hyper-V, and Storage Spaces for fully redundant hot backup of all data files.

There’s also more visibility for File History (the Microsoft take on Apple’s Time Machine), although the hooks were already in Win7 (known as Previous Versions). For Windows 8 Enterprise, Windows to Go is a tremendous boon. And Windows 8 really is fast and fluid, although I’d never tell Windows chief Steve Sinofsky that.

Good stuff! I want it (or at least most of it). But I am not going to suffer through Metro on the desktop to get it.

Now for the other reason why you people in Redmond need to make Metro optional and restore the Start menu: Obvious lapses in judgment are very bad marketing. I speak from personal experience — Metro on the desktop made me switch to the Mac for my primary work machine. I had an emotional reaction that went something like: First Vista and now this? Enough. I’ve had it!

Now, I admit, that wasn’t very rational or mature of me. I could have kept using my Windows 7 laptop as my primary work machine; I still run Windows 7 on my main home computer. I actually like it better than OS X, in fact. No doubt part of my bitter disappointment with Windows 8 stemmed from the fact I had high hopes; in theory, Metro seemed like a bold new way to bridge the desktop and mobile worlds.

Those hopes were dashed when I saw Metro pushed in the face of desktop users as the top-level UI and replacement for the Start menu. Ultimately, the real marketing problem is that desktop users will see Metro flitting across the screen and wonder: Who on earth would make a decision like that?

In reaction, rather than stick with Windows 7, they may turn to an alternative like I did — and not just the Mac. Android and iOS tablets are becoming more and more capable. Samsung and others are coming up with innovative new PC-like designs. Even Ubuntu is going to get another shot, this time wth a tablet OS. As we move from a PC-centric world to a cloud-centric world, it’s going to be easier than ever to pick and choose from a slew of non-Windows devices.

There’s nothing to prevent you Microsofties from shrugging and saying, “If you don’t like Windows 8, don’t buy it.” It’s your choice, Redmond. For your sake, though, I hope you’ve taken into account that customers have more choices than ever.

This article, “Please, Microsoft, for the love of Windows,” originally appeared at InfoWorld.com. Read more of Eric Knorr’s Modernizing IT blog. And for the latest business technology news, follow InfoWorld on Twitter.