You misunderstand Microsoft. They listen to their customers probably more than any other software company I know. Unfortunately, they have way more customers than any other software company I know. Hence the feature creep. They'll pretty much add anything people ask for (especially if people = big companies paying $75/Office seat). The definition of "what they do well" is Office, and in particular the fact that it's a jack of all trades, and a master of most.
As for the default font, I believe it's actually Calibri, which is a great sans serif font. Personal preference will dictate whether it's appropriate for your uses, but that's why it's a dropdown menu and not a hardcoded value. If I had to guess why they left Times New Roman, I would guess because based on their collected statistics more people use sans serif fonts, or maybe just that it's more readable. Also, TNR is pretty ugly.
Yeah you're right...that makes sense. But how would they collect statistics on whether people use sans serif fonts more? Because at a glance, it seems serif is used more. Students, teachers, professors and professional people who use office need formality, thus serif seems to be the obvious answer...
At any rate, yeah I guess it makes sense to me now. I still maintain that I feel like I'm drowning in the new interface for office though. Thanks for the insight.
As for the default font, I believe it's actually Calibri, which is a great sans serif font. Personal preference will dictate whether it's appropriate for your uses, but that's why it's a dropdown menu and not a hardcoded value. If I had to guess why they left Times New Roman, I would guess because based on their collected statistics more people use sans serif fonts, or maybe just that it's more readable. Also, TNR is pretty ugly.