Sight of Clippy, Internet Explorer scares baby

Reg reader introduces newborn to Microsoft ugly sweater. Child not amused

Microsoft's latest line of festive knitwear has been frightening babies, if the experience of the winner of The Register's 2025 Christmas competition is anything to go by.

Register reader Wolfetone won the garment earlier this month with his suggestion that peak Microsoft occurred with the advent of its demented paperclip-based assistant, often referred to as "Clippy." The fact that Wolfetone promised to wear it for the arrival of his second child sealed the deal as far as we were concerned.

However, unlike a normal Microsoft software release, the spawn of Wolfetone arrived ahead of schedule and, despite our reader professing delight at wearing "the second worst thing" in their wardrobe, the new arrival appears less than amused.

"He seems to start crying when I attempt to hold him while wearing the jumper," Wolfetone told us. "Make of that what you will."

We're not sure what is alarming the little tike most. The MS-DOS logo evokes a simpler, more soothing time (today's registry hacks make the battles involving autoexec.bat and config.sys seem a walk in the park by comparison). The MSN butterfly logo is charming, although the sight of Internet Explorer is enough to make any grown woman or man cry, let alone an innocent child.

More likely, it is the unblinking gaze of Clippy, whose eyes are portals into a future underpinned by Copilot. Gazing into that particular future is sure to set off the waterworks.

Still, we are delighted to see Microsoft's Artifact Sweater being put to good use and hope that Wolfetone Junior's aversion to the knitwear nightmare is short-lived. Alternatively, there is always the possibility that the poppet might do unto the garment what Microsoft does to its users' devices on a regular basis.

Sadly, however, one cannot simply pop a PC into the wash to undo whatever emissions have been expelled from Redmond this time around. ®