There is a reason (link via cleverhack) and I don’t buy it. The logic is like this: if they put a Shutdown button next to the Start button, we’d have people accidentally shutting down left and right. Very true, there should not be a Shutdown button next to the Start button. Bad idea.

So why not put a Shutdown button on the other end of the taskbar, far away from the Start button? It would make shutting down a one-click process. It wouldn’t even give you the option of choosing between a log-off or a restart. It would just shut the computer down, pronto. It would also be nice if the monitor would automatically shut off, but I suppose that’s getting picky.