[vijaybritto]

Yet they've had astounding success and is the most widely used operating system. Maybe usability and ease of access are far more important than beautiful design

[d3nj4l]

You can succeed despite poor taste, but that doesn't make your taste any less poor.

[marcellus23]

Design _is_ usability and ease of access.

[sriram_malhar]

I think it is marketing and sales muscle that leads to ease of access.

[AtlasBarfed]

Shockingly, monopolies and entrenchment in software is SUPER EFFECTIVE.

While MS isn't utterly technically bereft obviously, and they had some correct choices like backward compatibility and usability relative to imbeciles like IBM, just look at the botched execution of Win8, their security disasters, and generally superior products that got nudged out by beta-ware quality releases.