I would say a more accurate name would be the "fit window to content" button, as that is what it does.
If you're looking at a document in Pages, clicking that button will fit the window to the document, not wasting any screen space with blank unused area, but also not obscuring any of the document (screen space permitting).
The problem is that some third party applications ignore this and just implement Windows-style "maximise" behaviour. In addition, for some applications the 'content' area is likely to be larger than the screen (see Logic and Final Cut), so maximising actually makes sense.
What I imagine Apple's designers were considering is whether "maximise" behaviour actually makes sense. What are you gaining when you maximise a window? For applications such as Word, you're just filling the screen up with empty grey space on either side of the document. For most web pages, the content will appear within ~1000 pixels of horizontal space, with any additional space being wasted (or worse, the page has liquid resizing text, resulting in hard-to-read loooooooooooong lines when the window is maximised).
One argument may be that maximising a window blocks out distractions, but surely something like a full screen specific mode would be more appropriate for such a situation.
Ultimately I think that the problem is that users already have an expectation of what that button does; it is another casualty of the thoughtless interaction design that Windows has normalised to the general computer-using public.
If you're looking at a document in Pages, clicking that button will fit the window to the document, not wasting any screen space with blank unused area, but also not obscuring any of the document (screen space permitting).
The problem is that some third party applications ignore this and just implement Windows-style "maximise" behaviour. In addition, for some applications the 'content' area is likely to be larger than the screen (see Logic and Final Cut), so maximising actually makes sense.
What I imagine Apple's designers were considering is whether "maximise" behaviour actually makes sense. What are you gaining when you maximise a window? For applications such as Word, you're just filling the screen up with empty grey space on either side of the document. For most web pages, the content will appear within ~1000 pixels of horizontal space, with any additional space being wasted (or worse, the page has liquid resizing text, resulting in hard-to-read loooooooooooong lines when the window is maximised).
One argument may be that maximising a window blocks out distractions, but surely something like a full screen specific mode would be more appropriate for such a situation.
Ultimately I think that the problem is that users already have an expectation of what that button does; it is another casualty of the thoughtless interaction design that Windows has normalised to the general computer-using public.