I don't think it was ever a secret that the kernel and system was the same lineage, it was all about the config and whether various optional things (like IIS) w

I don't think it was ever a secret that the kernel and system was the same lineage, it was all about the config and whether various optional things (like IIS) were there by default. NT and 2000 were always business-targeted products with all the attendant usage-based licensing stuff that wasn't present in the consumer world, even though 2000 had a wide enthusiast userbase that was tired of 98 and ME and mostly figured out how to get games running well enough. Apple and various linux distros separated their products into "server" and "workstation" variants in the same way, too.