The Windows 95 Easter Egg Hidden For 25 Years

[@MichaelMJD]

It may be April Fools, but this story is completely true! Hope you enjoy the video! : )

[@TadaHrd]

I trust you

[@thetouhoubaka]

i hope i can trust you today xD

[@avus-kw2f213]

I highly doubt that

[@avus-kw2f213]

Upon further research it’s true

[@yxles]

Is really though??? Because if it does, Boi you chose the wrong day to release a content

[@The905Studios]

Considering this has been “forgotten” about until it was brought back up there MUST be hidden eggs in software that’s just straight up missing because who ever made it forget about it.

[@luluthecat1570]

Lol true

[@VLTNO]

forgot*

[@shroomiestshroom3655]

well by the sounds of it the guy responsible for putting them into 95, justin ferrari is dead, so we will never really know until the whole thing gets reverse engineered.

[@swirl6996]

i love how, even today, all the Windows 95 devs are still in contact with each other and discussing development stories

[@abiyasad2]

And getting their 9x era icons being swept away at Sun Valley update 🙏

[@toastytacos702]

Trauma bonding

[@CEO100able]

Wow, this is amazing to find out about after all those years! I first discovered the Windows 95 Product Team Credits easter egg in early 2012, so it's interesting to still see hidden content in old Microsoft products being found. Excellent video about it!

[@----.__]

You discovered it? Wow.

[@Tech-NO-City]

It was hidden for so long out of fear they would loose there jobs after the great Microsoft Easter egg crack down.

[@LouiesLog]

Wooo ee

[@emdotrod]

It's incredible how one easter egg can regroup some of the Windows 95 dev team members

[@oz_jones]

Avengers, assemble?

[@adamweb]

Wonder if there's a code to turn Clippy into Mortimer Twinkie?

[@ThinkAboutVic]

Michael MJD fans DankPods fans 🤝 Listening to "Walk through the park" in every video

[@Vinnieleverton]

geometry dash hidden picture

[@Macintosh200]

t h i s

[@Baopand]

I knew I'd find a Dank reference in here 😂

[@deepanjalideshpande5993]

Its A night alone not walk through the park

[@BFDI_1fan]

Im a dankpod fan lol

[@cartooncat9559]

You know it’s a good Easter egg when nobody finds it for 25 years

[@okamiboi]

"I suspect it was Justin's thing and we shall never find out." I guess that means "Justin" passed, so RIP sneaky dev that inserted this egg on Internet Mail o7

[@nukelauncher95]

Unfortunately Justin Ferrari was killed by a stray bullet in 2012.

[@okamiboi]

@@nukelauncher95 Dang, that's actually worse than I thought. Hope his soul rest in peace.

[@SabirTheHuman]

@@nukelauncher95 This is why people should never play with guns.

[@wernekinhoo]

It seams like he died in 2012 from a gun shot www.kiro7.com/news/man-admits-random-killing-seattle-father-zillow-de/246129111/ Very sad that we will never know why the password was MORTIMER

[@MichaelMJD]

@@wernekinhoo Very sad. RIP : (

[@logical...]

Legend has it the twinkie is still on the side of that window

[@Zhortac]

But, will it ever be eaten!?

[@joeynebulous816]

@@Zhortac yeah, one day

[@TRLTheRandomLab]

I have a feeling that someone will eventually discover a developer's suicide note hidden inside of Windows 95, considering we already have the Hall of Tortured Souls.

[@fishyc43sar]

No one explored the secrets of HoTS.

[@ekothesilent9456]

@@fishyc43sar .. heart of the swarm?

[@epicboomshine6595]

Hall of Tortured Souls.

[@BoomboxStudiosAndDexter]

Oh I see that Michael MJD has uploaded a video that isn't for April fools? Let me get my popcorn!

[@jmooroof1769]

It's legit though ima go on my win 95 pc and do it and see for myself

[@knucklesoldchannelarchived329]

Hi

[@joekerr9150]

@@jmooroof1769 holy shit you have a win95pc?

[@jmooroof1769]

@@joekerr9150 I do not have mail on it sadly. I can't seem to get it to connect to the internet, so mail would be useless.

[@Crystal-bari]

hi

[@prispalos]

I love the stark difference between a fan's (Michael MJD) perspective on easter eggs vs an actual Windows9x/NT developer's (Dave Plummer from Dave's Garage). DaveP has said that he *hates* easter eggs, but we, the fans, absolutely love them.

[@luckyhibiki1914]

Michael MJD fans RandomGamingInHD fans 🤝 being welcomed back to another video

[@doq]

Michael MJD fans DankPods fans 🤝 TrackTribe music

[@Macintosh200]

@@doq this

[@braxtonbunner4990]

why is this so true? Top two KZbinr's I watch every day.

[@TotalMK]

"Mortimer" could also be a reference to Commander Keen, the main character Keen is Billy Blaze and his nemesis is Mortimer McMire. Also Mortimer McMire uses the colors of Black and Red, the same colors the easter egg uses.

[@joshuaelectronics1759]

You’re a great channel. You deserve more attention than you get.

[@Fr4nk4000]

bro i thought Michael MJD was trolling me so hard and i get to the end of the video and it's actually real

[@dh2032]

? real news on April the First?

[@BilisNegra]

6:03 LOVED the Dave('s Garage) reference there. Did not expect to hear about him in the context of this story. Cool!

[@jerryfacts9749]

In Windows 10, open the control panel. In the search bar at the upper right type the letter A . Now you will see the complete list of all the main Windows OS commands listed by category and by alphabetical order.

[@JAzzWoods-ik4vv]

No easter eggs policy is the dumbest thing microsoft’s ever done

[@thatoneguy9582]

I mean I’d have to imagine there have definitely been worse decisions made but this is just kinda dumb

[@MarcoGPUtuber]

Two videos in an HOUR!? What a treat!

[@BilisNegra]

Well, the other one doesn't exactly qualify as a full-fledged one, right?

[@MarcoGPUtuber]

@@BilisNegra An MJD video is always a treat.

[@BilisNegra]

@@MarcoGPUtuber Ok, I guess you're right. It was a piece of minimalistic art!

[@iamakeyboard1234]

Well, it is nearly Easter!

[@Gokuevp]

A channel called Dave's Garage covered this and apparently he was the one that sent the grumpy email about easter eggs. I could be wrong tho.

[@NaviciaAbbot]

It probably was him, knowing his stories. He also crashed an easter egg and sent his findings in a companywide email. That got him off of that easter egg.

[@mc-not_escher]

Shoutout to all those Dave’s Garage fans out there, you know who you are! :)

[@saidtaliby]

Still waiting for him to give the meaning of Comfy Chair haha

[@NoStereo]

@@saidtaliby Hm, the only comfy chair I know of was actually a torture device used by the spanish inquisition in the early 1900s.

[@RebrandSoon0000]

Hello :-)

[@Ununoctium-]

The easter egg was discovered on March 26th, the same date that the comic strip featuring Mortimer ended.

[@TheCommanderCrapper]

I didn't even consider it was possible for this to be an april fools joke, I just clicked on it immediately lol With that being said, I wonder if there's any that are still hidden in XP?

[@fawkewe]

Verison 1 of Windows XP was completely decompiled so it’s extremely unlikely there’s anything about the operating system no one knows about.

[@HerecomestheCalavera]

This was actually already known. It was included in the Windows 95/NT Superguide. Since it seems to be so unknown that may be the first time it was mentioned. I guess since it is in a book and not easily searchable on the web that is the reason nobody remembers it being in the book. I need to see if I still have my copy laying around. If so I'll upload a video showing where it tells about the Mortimer code.

[@Crux161]

Mortimer was also the original name for Mickey Mouse... which is hilarious because of Disney’s occult connections. Apparently the name means something like “Dead Sea” - from French (mort + mer)...

[@jamescollier3]

Windows 10 Easter Egg: A fast computer laptop. No one has found it yet

[@pvshka]

Even my mid-range laptop gets crappier with each update. Time to backup and go Ubuntu.

[@PCWindowstechguy]

Yay a real video on 1st of april.I like the times when new easter eggs get discovered.Great video MJD.

[@Eric_The_Cleric]

I didn't even know Windows 95 had Easter Eggs. That's cool that it was found right before Easter!

[@arctic_haze]

I'm glad to hear that the developers of Windows 95 are still around. I really liked that OS version.

[@macinman]

Hey MJD, just wanted to let you know, your piano music in the video today made me think of the Peanuts. Usually that was the same kind of Jazz / easy listening music used in the soundtrack. Interesting video all around. Have a great day!

[@julcaos]

I imagine how that must be one of the cool sides to being a software developer... people talk to you about it, and you're like thinking to yourself, "yeah, I codded that thingamajig"...

[@ManuelLopezTovar]

I was literally waiting for your video on this new Easter egg!

[@David_Granger]

Heard the non april fools news about Minecraft? About the new world limit being the 64 bit integer limit with a new mod that was incredibly complicated to make.

[@kbhasi]

This is reminding me of a Windows XP Easter egg I discovered many years ago and posted about to The Easter Egg Archive, then posted a video to my own KZbin channel later on. It's hidden within the icon resources of Windows Messenger, and seemed to suggest to me that the Messenger team may have been poking fun at or bullying the Office team at the time.

[@toast99bubbles]

I'm sat here waiting for the two videos that DankPods uploads on a Thursday and see your video and you start playing music that DankPods also plays in some of his videos.

[@TechNetworkUK]

Yes finally the real video

[@CEO100able]

Fantastic! It was very informative.

[@kiyoshi_the_devil]

This "Headphone-Test-Music[;)]" just reminds me of another great channel

[@coincollectorsaustralia6396]

Is it dankpods?

[@kiyoshi_the_devil]

@@coincollectorsaustralia6396 oh yeah...

[@Y0shiart2]

From what I know, “Mortimer” was a hidden object gane I played during the old Wildtangent UI: Orb days. Mortimer Beckett and the Time Paradox.

[@SimilakChild]

There is also an easter egg in the Windows 95 Telnet application. you have to type in modem cmds followed by a line of text.

[@fsp0_]

I read about this in a Finnish tech magazine. Very interesting topic!

[@Noschool100]

From the title and date I though Microsoft had laid an Easter egg that somehow wouldn't activate until April fools 2021. Still interesting tho.

[@jofawe]

Don't forget that many of the old forums and webhosting services from 1998-2010 is gone and every webpage related to it too. I remember vaguely the phrase Mortimer as an Easter egg from an old Easter egg-homepage.

[@leneal2315]

Wow this is amazing! I love that all of the devs started to respond and talk about their sneaky methods of adding easter eggs into code!

[@captainiplier9162]

agreed! also i love your pfp :)

[@mattm7220]

I went into this video with suspicion since it had an April 2nd date (in Australia, which is April 1st for the US), but this turned out truly interesting. I love knowing that people are still finding new things in Windows 95, even in 2021 😂. Also, it's great seeing the devs basically go on a nostalgia trip when it got brought up on Twitter.

[@JacobT93]

I think the email about Easter eggs came from Dave Plummer, he recently made a video about this egg and another on his channel and managed to use this Easter egg to cause a crash to prove his point that they shouldn't be in the release versions of the OS !

[@marcgrundfest1495]

It's hard enough to avoid bugs and backdoor without games and other bullshit...see solar winds...

[@besotoxicomusic]

My mom was always Apple and my pops always pc. She had this T-shirt she’d wear when we’d go to software conventions and swap meets that said “Windows 95 = Macintosh 87”. It used to drive pops nuts.

[@drzazgi666]

Have you tried searching the newsgroup archives for Mortimer before that date?

[@detectingretro6313]

Brilliant. Going to check out your Windows 98 Easter eggs now

[@Vlad-1986]

Asking to remove them? I really think Easter eggs are one of the coolest and more memorable features for any kind of software!

[@levi7581]

That immediate "Hold on!? My spidey senses are tingling..." moment when you hear DankPods background music on Michael's video... very satisfying an nice... props to you Michael and to the Dankest of Pods Wade... :)

[@MichaelMJD]

Didn’t know he uses that music too, lol!

[@levi7581]

@@MichaelMJD Yes he mostly uses it when showcasing how good or bad the product in question is in terms of sound quality... plays that Walk Through the Park (I think that's what's it called) music and puts the product on the "creepy ears on a stand" for the viewers to listen

[@goodboy02network90]

If it was anytime after the release of The Sims in 2000, I would’ve thought this referenced the infamous character Mortimer Goth.

[@JeffSmith03]

Yay, we need more stories like this today, otherwise we would just assume that every thing we hear is April fool's joke.

[@fessvi]

We're not going to question that Twinkie siting by the window in the sun for days that had a name?

[@DavidWonn]

I first heard of the Mail Easter Egg from Dave’s Garage. If you don’t have Windows 95 B or C, you can recreate the steps on a VM that runs in your browser at copy.sh slash v86.

[@Windows_98]

Eyy, nice job! u found all of Windows 95 easter eggs! Or have you?

[@rage4win_120]

Lucas Brooks found an easter egg 36 years later in Windows 1.0. He posted a tweet about it. :)

[@azone123465]

Easter eggs help give a product soul and character... Upper management, "We are an upstanding company, we have no soul, remove all Easter eggs, or be banished to heaven."

[@alessandrozara924]

Talking about reverse engineering, I remember the "Space Cadet" pinball game from Windows 98 and XP. I am using Linux now and I have discovered that you can find the game in the software center in most Debian-based and Arch-based Linux operating systems including Ubuntu. In this OS, though, the version of "Space Cadet" pinball included is the "Full Tilt" one.

[@markpoole7340]

One Easter egg I have not seen mentioned is the teapot that can appear in the screen saver called Pipes, I have seen it 4 times. It happened randomly with (I think it's called ) joints turned on

[@ChaseMC215]

Hall Of Tortured Souls... It is kind of a creepypasta, which was shown in Top 22 Gaming Creepypastas by Tats Top 10.

[@blainepalmerza]

Awesome video, Michael!

[@MichaelMJD]

Thanks!

[@oosha2000]

This is amazing. 2025: Hidden easter egg in windows 7

[@RWebster325]

I wouldn't be surprised if it had been found before but just forgotten. Quite a bit of printed published material from that period still hasn't made it online yet to make it easily found in an internet search.

[@solracer66]

To me it seems most likely that this Easter egg is a reference to both Trading Places and Coming to America. In Trading Places Don Ameche played Mortimer Duke and I’m Coming to America Mortimer and his brother Randolf suddenly appeared in a pile of garbage when Eddie Murphy’s Prince Akeem tosses a large wad of cash into the garbage pile. Randolf responds by saying “Mortimer, we’re back!”. At least if you asked this computer programmer (not at Microsoft) at that time to name a Mortimer Trading Places would have been my first answer.

[@WindowsSe7enXP]

Hey Michael, Great Video. Maybe Another Thing You Could Cover is the Mystery Surrounding The Windows Server 2K3 UK Startup Sound

[@scruffyronin9382]

I wasn’t expecting a serious video after the last one, this is kinda neat

[@AzureOtsu]

hidden for 25 years uploaded 25 minutes ago

[@gavincurtis]

Early 2000 year Volvo seat control modules have an easter egg in the CPU's unused memory. Programmer talks about his daughter, she likes bugs and frogs if I remember.

[@startracer6012]

Microsoft had time to add easter eggs, wondering if they will ever get round to finishing their half baked operating system

[@RevenUlfir]

found the line "I Hate Jello" when looking at some microsoft code.

[@OliveIsTyping]

This is the earliest I’ve ever been

[@genisis3457]

same

[@amogus7]

Same

[@nathanaelculver5308]

Huh. Never knew this was unknown outside of MS. I knew of it at the time, but then I was working for Microsoft during W95 launch.

[@Mr_CutieMark]

Happy to see a normal video today

[@CEO100able]

Same here! It was very informative (legitimately).

[@trajectoryunown]

5:15 So, we're just gonna ignore this Twinkie story and pretend like it's not completely mental?

[@micke7]

I loved and love that comic. Opus and what theyre called. Bloom County. Thanks for the memories! Would never have thoughts of writing MORTIMER anywhere in W95. Those were the days!

[@TheSkunkyMonk]

I do wonder if its a case of the story that Jon Hare told about making the light blink on a HDD when they were new on a system so the customer knew what they had paid for was getting used. Good way to spend time and fill up memory and space. Thing is if the big players optimise, it doesn't sell hardware. //Should of read the date

[@NorseGraphic]

Justin's reason for the password is simple, they needed MORE TIME for the product...

[@99akol992]

Bruh this is like real life Ready Player 1, but with no prize

[@castlejeta9019]

So I bought one of those clapper Christmas story additions. Damn thing will not work, this made me feel better about it.

[@simonj48]

The internet history snooping really had a feel of some grunters searching for the egg in ready player one. lol, the internet is a wonderful, terrible, place. Thanks

[@digitalunity]

woah, woah... that hall of tortured souls looks familiar... Didn't know that part of ENA was based on something. I know it's weird to bring that up, maybe even out of place or weird, but that's neat

[@fouzanium]

Microsoft should’ve just allowed dev names to be put in the “About” section in the Help tab

[@moodberry]

Yes, but you still didn't explain how the discoverer of this egg came up with Mortimer as their clue. What or who gave them that word?

[@cheesegod4298]

This secret is as old as a rotten egg.

[@cjmccormick7816]

Keep on making videos! I love them ❤️

[@supdan]

Well, you never stop discovering things, that's for sure.

[@quadflopper1012]

Michael, do you know if with w2k you can repair an install by loading windows over windows (upgrade) like you can with xp?

[@reallifelima7951]

Of course they blame it on the deceased team member

[@RonnyFebri]

Yea, i read the news about this easter egg too, but since windows 95 is not on my pcs anymore i cannot tested it, thanks michael

[@realfamiliarfez]

Fun Fact kids, Cortana is literally an easter egg herself since there is a character from Halo called Cortana.

[@jonnyOysters]

Funny how people are talking about April fools Day when it's literally Easter lol

[@moelester7527]

Just in time for Easter!!!

[@juangutierrez5400]

Now this is an actual video.

[@ArgentinaPrimermundo]

MORTIMER HAS BEEN THE NAME OF A SCRUBBER SPONGE DISH CLEANER HERE IN ARGENTINA FOR DECADES

[@linkthehero1234]

dang two videos in one day

[@tendstofortytwo]

Have you seen Dave Plummer's video about this?

[@MondySpartan]

The world is full of possibilities.

[@KialIrvin]

1:11 I thought I was comparing headphones on a stick with ears. shout out to you if you get that reference