Microsoft"s partner group manager, Simon Aldous, stated in an interview with PCR that Microsoft had tried to "create a Mac look and feel in terms of graphics" for Windows 7.
The full quote from the interview is as follows:
One of the things that people say an awful lot about the Apple Mac is that the OS is fantastic, that it"s very graphical and easy to use. What we"ve tried to do with Windows 7 – whether it"s traditional format or in a touch format – is create a Mac look and feel in terms of graphics. We"ve significantly improved the graphical user interface, but it"s built on that very stable core Vista technology, which is far more stable than the current Mac platform, for instance.
Redmond immediately issued a statement last night stating that Aldous" comments "were inaccurate and uninformed." In a post on the Windows Team blog, Microsoft blogger Brandon LeBlanc confirmed, "unfortunately this came from a Microsoft employee who was not involved in any aspect of designing Windows 7. I hate to say this about one of our own, but his comments were inaccurate and uninformed."
At a demonstration of Windows 7 at PDC 2008 a Microsoft worker joked that "Microsoft copied another operating system" referring to previous versions of Windows instead of Mac OSX.