The settings dashboard design with icons and text goes back a long way, including Windows 3.1 and Windows 95: http://www.guidebookgallery.org/pics/gui/settings

The settings dashboard design with icons and text goes back a long way, including Windows 3.1 and Windows 95: http://www.guidebookgallery.org/pics/gui/settings/menu/win31.png http://www.guidebookgallery.org/pics/gui/settings/menu/win31... http://www.guidebookgallery.org/pics/gui/settings/menu/win95.png http://www.guidebookgallery.org/pics/gui/settings/menu/win95... I think it's still a clean, elegant way to present OS settings on modern computers (large display, mouse input). The best way "discovered" to date. So if anyone is copying anyone, it's that people are copying the best known way to do it. --------------------------- Side Rant: Microsoft started diverging away from the above with Windows XP (or was it Windows ME?) by buring things: http://www.energystar.gov/ia/products/power_mgt/winXP_control_panel.jpg http://www.energystar.gov/ia/products/power_mgt/winXP_contro... ...and made it extremely difficult to navigate by Windows Vista/7/8 by sticking things inside sub-categories inside of sub-categories: http://screenshots.modemhelp.net/screenshots/Windows_Vista/Control_Panel/Home_View/Index.jpg http://screenshots.modemhelp.net/screenshots/Windows_Vista/C... It's a different, more complex way to do the same thing. Nobody is copying them though. ;)