Wordpad was the step between notepad and paid Word. When I used Windows, I would use wordpad because it was free and had more features than notepad. But since I switched to Linux and there is Google Docs, I have had no need for any of them.
And there are other better free options now. I will not miss Wordpad.
True, nowadays there are better options out there like libreoffice and probably other foss projects out there
LibreOffice is a breath of fresh air. Watching things go more cloud-based and/or using the gross “SAAS” model, it’s really nice to have software that does everything I need it to do without all the bullshit.
I was told I needed Microsoft Office when I was in college for my masters. I bought it but never used it, because LibreOffice just worked better.
They tried something similar with MSPaint, but it’s still around. The matter of the fact is that windows only appeal to the average person is that you don’t have to jump through a million hoops to get it to do what you want it to do. Push too far and Linux suddenly becomes appealing.
Probably just as well - RTF had its time and it was nowhere near recently.
There were so many Foss options that did what wordpad does but better. Wordpad was the weird kid who kept talking about how great RTF is while literally nobody else wanted to go near RTF because it is a trash file format.
wordpad also does word files. maybe not intricately-formatted ones or that use advanced features 98% of users don’t even know exist, but for basic shit, it was just fine. the only essential thing it lacked, and that microsoft intentionally left out for fear of hurting ms office suite sales, was a spell checker.