Check out this ancient Windows 1.0 Easter egg featuring Gabe Newell

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Hop in your time machine and rewind the clock to the days of Windows 1.0.

Windows Event
Windows Event (Image credit: Microsoft)

What you need to know

  • A tech-minded Twitter tweeter has shared a tiny Easter egg nestled away within Windows 1.0.
  • It's a list containing names of the (at-the-time) Windows team, which happened to include Gabe Newell, whom you may recognize as the president of Valve.

It's always fun to find Windows 11 Easter eggs. But what if you were able to find a Windows 1 Easter egg? Because it looks like someone just did.

Over on Twitter, Lucas Brooks disclosed a Windows 1.0 find: A list of the at-the-time Windows team (via WinFuture). The list contains a little "congrats!" text bubble and even contains a particularly important name: "Gabe Newell."

If Newell's name rings a bell, it's because he's the guy leading Valve, the company behind Steam. For those of you who don't know, early on in Newell's career, he worked at Microsoft on some of the earliest versions of Windows. And his indirect ties to Microsoft still aren't over. For proof, just check out how Microsoft and Valve worked together to enhance gamers' Steam Deck experience.

You're going to have to take a peek at Lucas' Twitter thread for the full scoop on how the Easter egg was uncovered; it's a real doozy of tech terminology talk for anyone who's not familiar with the inner workings of ye olde Windows 1.0 or Windows innards in general. But still, anything that leads to this sort of discovery is worthy of chatter, even if the behind-the-scenes details may be a bit too in the weeds for average trivia enthusiasts to dig into.

If you want more deep-dive Windows lore, don't forget that a couple of references to Windows 9 were also recently uncovered by data-digging cyber sleuths.

Robert Carnevale
Robert Carnevale

Robert Carnevale is the News Editor for Windows Central. He's a big fan of Kinect (it lives on in his heart), Sonic the Hedgehog, and the legendary intersection of those two titans, Sonic Free Riders. He is the author of Cold War 2395. Have a useful tip? Send it to robert.carnevale@futurenet.com.