Microsoft Bob | The World's Weirdest Product

to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code NATIONSQUID.

Microsoft Bob was an addon for Windows released in 1995, intended to make the computer easier to use. However, the product's attempts completely went south, and Bob has since earned a strange, almost forgotten reputation within the tech space.

Despite this legacy, Microsoft Bob has proven to be, indirectly, quite influential. Not only has it provided us many Windows features that we still take for granted today (Rover the Dog, Comic Sans, just to name a few!), but it even foreshadowed and predicted many aspects of a very prominent part of the industry that is still rapidly growing today.

So, what's the full story to this strange product?

Support me on Patreon!

Buy Me a Coffee:

Website:

Beauty Flow by Kevin MacLeod

Wholesome by Kevin MacLeod

All images, sounds, and clips are either created by me, properly licensed, in the public domain, under a Creative Commons license with attribution provided, or protected under Fair Use.

ENJOY THE PROGRAM.

[nationsquid]

to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code NATIONSQUID.

[rad]

If I'm ever put in charge of a major corporation, I'm going to make the entire company use Microsoft Bob just to fuck with them.

[THEchakkid]

"instead of going to the calendar app, searching for it etc etc, you could just click on the calendar on the wall" bro that's fucking genius

[southvale]

i was OBSESSED. with microsoft bob as a kid. I LOVED it. i was actually REALLY upset when my dad updated the OS to Windows 98 and i lost my Microsoft Bob access. Microsoft Bob baby please come back to me i miss you :(

[Tetriser]

Here's the funniest thing: Microsoft Bob was included in one of the *game* warez CDs I had as a kid, and thought "wait, is this even a game?" and got confused

[ryefieldshiningsun]

can we just agree that the artstyle of microsoft bob is really cool? i personally love it, its blockiness, oldschool but interesting use of color. and the animations are super cute.

[SirSaizo]

I don't know who or what a Microsoft Bob is, but I'd trust him with my life.

[speedwagoncito]

Comic Sans has a bit of an unfair reputation, it seems. Sure, we can all agree that it might not be the "most appealing" font out there, but its been mentioned many times that it's quite literally one of the fonts with highest legibility, even for people with dyslexia.

[changsiah]

By the way fun fact Rover would end up showing up on Windows XP when you're searching for files

Thank you LGR

[magitek_riding_imperial_witch]

Not gonna lie. I kinda want the cartoony, Mario Paint meets Edutainment aesthetic of Microsoft B🤓b back.

[meredithmoulton]

My cousin and I used to love making rooms on this thing in the mid-90s. We basically just used it as a doll house and acted as interior decorators. I miss it.

[Zdwojson]

My dear foreign friend. You know I'm from Poland. I learned about Microsoft Bob from a local film about the History of Windows. I never used it because of the time I started using a computer with Windows XP. Speaking of Windows XP, it will be 10 years on April 8, 2024, since it passed away to the computer beyond on April 8, 2014.

[wadmodderschalton]

The typeface Comic Sans was made during Microsoft Bob's development but it wasn't used anywhere in the program for unknown reasons, but it was probably cut due to time and budget constraints.

[decisionparalysis]

I have such fond memories of this program, it was on the first computer my parents bought, I treated it very much like a game. I remember my parents pawning that computer and getting another after some time, but the program was not on that one, it was very unfortunate, sad really. I know now that it was really not that great, lackluster, but as a kid it really was like living in a virtual world even though most of the features were out of my limited skill or abilities. Later I found a copy of The Journeyman Project Turbo at a yard sale, and it really hit me in a lot of the same ways, today everything seems so simplistic in nature but those were moments I will never forget, the two defining experiences of my introduction to computers. Thank you for making this video, love the nostalgia, Microsoft Bob will always take me back to childhood.

[mirandarae]

Omg 3 NationSquid videos in 1 week? Weve been blessed

[DrekiTech]

It feels like this could've been very successful if it was marketed towards kids as an introduction to computers in that era! Kids computing grew into a huge industry.

[spectroglobe]

Microsoft BOB is my favorite niche ever, I’m so excited about this video I clicked that notif right away, more people need to know about this!

[hlavco]

I had so much fun with Microsoft Bob as a kid. We'd spend hours just building houses and placing furniture. It was like some Windows 95 version of Animal Crossing.

A few years later I attempted to use Bob for its intended purpose, as an alternate desktop, but discovered its limitations pretty quickly:
1. There was no password security. If you guessed your password wrong a couple times, the program would just... let you pick a new one.
2. Bob was unable to launch programs that changed the screen resolution, which meant that you couldn't place shortcuts to many later computer games into it.

[strappadork]

When I found out that this existed as a kid I was so confused why people considered it to be bad because I thought it looked so cool.

[glovebox]

literally just searched your channel after like a year of not watching