"You might not remember us" - as a matter of fact, I do, and it's not a very happy bunch of memories. It's the horror of the times when pages proudly proclaimed "Designed for IE 4; ActiveX required." Is that somehow supposed to be a Good Thing, nowadays? Or is that "sorry, I the browser have grown up, and won't beat you again (too much). Oh, except you need Win8, and it's two almost-identical browsers now, and one of them can't play Flash (just like the 90s, yaaay)"?
IMNSHO, someone at MS has just read "induce nostalgia in your target audience, never mind your barely tolerable product" from a DYI Marketing 101 handbook. I remember all that crap they've pushed at me in the 90s, are they sure they want me to recall all those memories?
Was this really that different from all the badges telling people their site was best viewed in Netscape Navigator 2.0--a commercial browser with over 70% market-share largely caused by exclusive bundling agreements with Internet Service Providers--as they relied on Netscape-specific extensions like framesets or required installing Java applets that were accessed using the Netscape-specific JavaScript/Java bridge?
You are quite correct - that wasn't too different; and I like the current situation of "just use any current browser," thankyouverymuch.
But I don't see any descendants of Netscape claiming that I should be nostalgic for these times; or saying "oh, we are rooted in Netscape's legacy, and that's why you should use our browser". That doesn't make any sense beyond "we don't suck any more, really, take our word for it" - and, honestly, that's not a very encouraging motto, when you stop to think about it.
IMNSHO, someone at MS has just read "induce nostalgia in your target audience, never mind your barely tolerable product" from a DYI Marketing 101 handbook. I remember all that crap they've pushed at me in the 90s, are they sure they want me to recall all those memories?