Redmond’s experimental designs department must be on vacation. Microsoft’s new VEDa concept, unveiled in a recently discovered patent application from Microsoft, looks more like a VHS tape crossed with a really old top loading cassette deck which is sitting on top of a lappy. I doubt that’s what Microsoft had in mind, however. One part of the rather lengthy discussion of the “technology” describes how the Start menu would contain tasks instead of the names of actual applications. An example, it seems, would be Web Browsing instead of Internet Exploder. Of course, how any of this justifies a patent is completely beyond me. All of the elements described are already in use in one form or another, and Microsoft can modify how their Start menu works any time they please.

written by Tyler Regas