"Despite the complete absurdity of the design request, and the complete practicality of his answer, the job will go to a candidate who manages to answer the question by designing an extremely overcomplicated solution for a completely non-existent problem. And that candidate will be the same person who designs their software."
Why am I not surprised that Microsoft is credited with coming up with this type of interview?
The classic anecdote about solving the wrong problem is asking engineers to deal with bicycle handle bars getting cold when it's cold outside: they design an expensive thermal heating system that weighs down the bike and makes the bike more expensive than the competition.
The non-engineer's response to the problem is to wear gloves.
To be fair, I hear Google asks similar questions, and I don't think anyone would argue that Google's software is too complex (at least from a user-interface perspective).
Why am I not surprised that Microsoft is credited with coming up with this type of interview?