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{{color|white|Y}} The little bits of stuff programmers left behind in the game. They're secrets, intended to tickle the fancy of those who discover them. Programs far too numerous to mention have included Easter eggs—everything from Microsoft Office to ''[[Grand Theft Auto]]: [[Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas|San Andreas]]''.
 
SadlyOriginally, Easter eggs were inserted by programmers for companies whose policy forbid them from receiving individual credit for their work. The earliest Easter eggs were mostly credits pages, possibly to allow the programmers themselves to prove authorship to friends. For security reasons (and concerns about malicious programmers inserting undocumented and destructive code), most companies don't allow Easter eggs to appear in their software anymore, but as individual programmers now receive full credit for their work, it's a moot point. {{color|white|Congratulations! You found an easter egg on this page!}} For instance, Microsoft has largely disallowed Easter eggs as part of its Trustworthy Computing Initiative, under the simple rationale that a user should be able to trust that the computer he's using is reliable and reasonably error-free. This hasn't completely stopped the company from incorporating them into their products however, although later Microsoft easterEaster eggs tend to be much simpler in nature (e.g. a reference to the company's founding date or Master Chief making cameos on Xbox consoles) unlike the more elaborate developer credits and minigames the company's employees have included within Windows and Office.
 
Originally, Easter eggs were inserted by programmers for companies whose policy forbid them from receiving individual credit for their work. The earliest Easter eggs were mostly credits pages, possibly to allow the programmers themselves to prove authorship to friends. For security reasons (and concerns about malicious programmers inserting undocumented and destructive code), most companies don't allow Easter eggs to appear in their software anymore, but as individual programmers now receive full credit for their work, it's a moot point. {{color|white|Congratulations! You found an easter egg on this page!}}
 
Easter eggs aren't just found in games anymore: the term is also used for a variety of hidden content, such as unadvertised [[DVD Bonus Content]].
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* Microsoft is pretty well known for its myriad of Easter eggs sprinkled throughout its early products. Unsurprisingly, any form of Easter Egg in Microsoft products [https://web.archive.org/web/20100330065403/http://blogs.msdn.com/larryosterman/archive/2005/10/21/483608.aspx has been banned] by [[Executive Veto]] ever since as part of its Trustworthy Computing Initative, with the rationale of Microsoft wanting to forge trust from its users by eliminating everything that isn't documented or could potentially cause unnecessary bloat if not security issues as a result of unsanctioned code. Though as stated above, Microsoft's practice of inserting hidden stuff to their products did not cease completely, as Easter eggs do still crop up from time to time albeit in a less elaborate way e.g. mascot cameos like the Ninja Cat and Master Chief or references to the company's history.
** Microsoft Excel 97 had a hidden Flight Simulator mode that could be triggered by inputting a specific set of commands while in a brand new spreadsheet.
** Similarly, users of Microsoft Excel 95 could reach a ''[[Doom]]''-style "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwg9eLHZZRo Hall of Tortured Souls]". This became something of a controversial Easter egg when some have taken the Doom-esque minigame grossly out of context and misinterpreted it as a [[Everyone Is Satan in Hell|satanic]] secret proof of [[Bill Gates]] being the [[Antichrist]].
*** Finally, Excel 2000 featured a ''[[Spy Hunter]]'' style driving game dubbed "Dev Hunter" by its fans.
** In Windows 3.1, a certain sequence of keys would replace the Windows logo in the "About Windows" dialogue with a portrait of Bill Gates or (depending on what code was entered), a polar bear.
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