Memories of the Windows 95 Release

When Windows 95 came out, I was living in NJ. Being a PC user, I went to a Windows 95 Release party that is indelibly tattooed on my brain. I didn’t have the cash at the time to upgrade, but I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. By the end of the night, I would go home and borrow money to buy a copy of this new operating system.

Yes, it was just that inspiring.

Returning to the party, I was amazed at the amount of energy present. People were treating an operating system release like the release of a blockbuster film or album.

Big technology releases are commonplace now, and this was perhaps not the first “big” one. But this was something I had never seen firsthand. The experience would stay with me for life.

Besides the normal balloons and finger foods, they had this amateur singer they hired to sing a song that I will always associate with Windows 95. He was sort of an R&B singer, and he just sang the words Windows 95 again and again, occasionally throwing in some weird beatboxing and scatting. It was scary amazing.

If I owned a video camera at the time, I would have a webpage dedicated just to his performance. Since that won’t happen, here is a clever little unrelated animated commercial by Bill Plimpton made to for the release of Windows 95.

Bill Plimpton Windows 95 Release Commercial

Now, I cannot remember how the song went exactly, but it went something like this:

Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 -Win – dows -9 —- 5 – Windows 9 – t – 5

Break it down…

Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 – Windows 95 -Win – dows -9 —- 5 – Windows 9 – t – 5