Despite Microsoft’ recent attempting to improve fix their products and their product design through mimicking Apple’s retail stores as well as superficial interpretations of Apple’s operating system style, there’s just something soulless about everything Microsoft does.
Somehow they manage to make whitespace feel like dead space. It’s the same feeling I get when I walk into a Walmart:




All 3 of these screenshots just blend together. There’s nothing unique about any of them. No heirarchy, no details. Nothing.
This clip of Steve Jobs must be at least 20 years old, but it’s just as relevant:

The only problem with Microsoft is that they just have no taste. They have absolutely no taste …I don’t mean that in a small way, I mean that in a big way …In the sense that they don’t think of original ideas and they don’t bring much culture into their product. And you say, ‘Why is that important?’ …Proportionally spaced type comes from typesetting and beautiful books, that’s where one gets the idea. If it weren’t for the Mac they would never have that in their products.