Ah, Friday: the one day of the week when we can let what we laughingly refer to as our "focus" drift from Apple-flavored drama to anything bad about the Evil Empire that makes us feel superior in petty little ways. Yes, folks, it's time once again for Wildly Off-Topic Microsoft-Bashing Day, and as always, it's a little tough to pick a topic. For a while we were sure we'd discuss this week's launch of MSN Search, Microsoft's belated but heavily-hyped attempt to out-Google Google; while we're hearing grudging admissions that bits of it are pretty good, we've gotten a hefty chunk of mail from viewers who have tried basic searches with Microsoft's new engine and gotten completely baffling results. Indeed, The Register states that MSN Search is "better in almost every way than Google, except for one: its search results are terrible." Gee, minor problem there.

But somehow yet another screed dissecting Microsoft Google 2004 just seems too predictable, so instead we thought we'd ramble on about how crappy Windows software is eventually going to get a cop killed. Faithful viewer Kevlar directed us to a CNET article a couple of days ago about the San Jose police department's transition to a "new mobile dispatch system that includes a Windows-based touch-screen computer in every patrol car"-- a fitting piece of techno-bling for cops in Silicon Valley. Unfortunately, it seems that the interface was so poorly designed that the officers who have been forced to use it "have said they wish the department had retained and upgraded the old system"; considering that the old system was text-based software written in 1990, that speaks volumes about the new system's shortcomings.

Dispatchers complain that the new system leaves them "unable to perform several tasks at one time," while inaccurate maps, screens "cluttered with unnecessary information," and even the use of a barely-legible font rendered the system borderline dangerous to patrol officers in the field. Reportedly performing even the most basic and common tasks requires overly complex sequences of steps to accomplish. As the president of the local cops' union puts it, "do you think if you're hunkered down and someone's shooting at you in your car, you're going to be able to sit there and look for Control or Alt or Function?"

But can we realistically blame Microsoft and Windows for the interface of a third party application? Of course we can! For one thing, we're not journalists (or even "journalists"), so we have absolutely no professional standard of accuracy or fairness to live up to. More importantly, though, we honestly believe that the ridiculously user-hostile-- well, okay, maybe it's more "user-oblivious"-- interface philosophy that's been a cornerstone of the Windows experience since the dawn of time engenders similarly crappy design in the platform's developer community. If you know that over 90 percent of the market opts for an operating system with as half-assed an attitude toward user interface as Windows's happens to be, why bother trying to do better? And in Intergraph's case, when it slapped together the interface for its police software, why would it have bothered to talk to the actual police officers who would rely on the system to get their jobs done? After all, Microsoft wouldn't.

And so we arrive at the obvious conclusion: Bill Gates is a cop-killer. Ta-daaa!