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I didn't talk about how I personally drive. Since you have nothing more than ad hominem to babble about, it is clear that you lack the ability to add anything of substance and value to the conversation. Instead, here's my response to your assertion; an example of a rebuttal that actually discusses what was brought up.

I generally stick to the speed limit unless everyone starts trying to get around me, in which case I speed up to match. Speeding rarely shaves off enough time to matter so I opt out of receiving traffic tickets for it, confident in the knowledge that while I have not arrived at my destination 30 seconds faster, I also don't have to worry about paying bullshit traffic fines to the government and a ton of extra money every month for higher insurance.

And here's the rebuttal that argues more on your current level: fuck you, asshat.

You may like this.

I'm still running Empire on an HP3000, a text game first run in 1973 on an HP2000C at empire.openmpe.com

Command line driven over simple telnet. (If you don't mind lots of typing.)

Recent blog entry on the HP3000 newswire:

http://3000newswire.blogs.com/...

There's an interesting blog post from Tomi Ahonen about this - he agrees it probably won't happen. http://communities-dominate.bl...

Port it to a cellphone that sold several millons and still can be found in a lot of markets and your user base can grow a lot in short time.

Of course, that installation is not for the common user, but the ones that will do it probably will be the kind that will ask or program apps for it... not sure if Android apps support is included and will run in the N9, but native and ported ones from meego, BB10 and others probably will.

Let me tell you why that's bullshit.

Until late 2010, Nokia's market share was around 70% -- uncontested leader, twice the size of Apple, four times bigger than Samsung, and consistently, immensely profitable. They had the largest ecosystem and the top-selling app store. Carriers and retailers loved Nokia. Customer fidelity was near absolute. Market analysts expected Nokia to remain the leader for years. Maybe Symbian was getting a bit long in the tooth, but MeeGo was on the way.

After the "burning platforms" and the move to Winblows Phoney, however... their market share collapsed overnight. Users, carriers, and retailers fully rejected it. While the press was drooling over the first MeeGo phone, they gave it a very limited launch and announced that no more would be made. Ratings companies now rank Nokia stock as junk.

You call this "a fairly good job"? Well, sure, taking in account that this was Elop's true goal all along: to sabotage Nokia, make its stock near worthless so that Microsoft could buy the whole damn thing. He achieved what he meant to, and killed Nokia while doing so.

let's make "Elop" a verb meaning to abandon a company's popular proven products in favor of an over-designed unusable system, which causes the company to lose sales

Look up the term 'Elop Effect', defined as what happens when you combine the Osborne Effect (making your current product appear obsolete by prematurely pre-announcing its successor) and the Ratner Effect (damaging sales by disparaging your own products).

bullshit http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/now-we-know-why-nokias-elop-had-a-25m-personal-bonus-clause-from-the-nokia-board-if-he-was-able-to-s.html

Nokia was far from tanking before Elop took over. True its networking and mapping units were not performing well, but its phone unit was increasing faster than any other company, including Apple. The change in profitability and market share for Nokia's smartphone unit was dramatic and recordsetting in its loss. Then, of course, Elop got a 25 million dollar bonus for selling off the now wrecked smartphone unit off to Microsoft.
I don't know why any company would want Elop near the reigns ever again.
http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/now-we-know-why-nokias-elop-had-a-25m-personal-bonus-clause-from-the-nokia-board-if-he-was-able-to-s.html

You might be wrong about how bad Nokia was pre-Elop:

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/10/pinpointing-the-elop-effect-3-pictures-from-nokia-financial-data-all-agree-it-was-february-2011.html

I am reminded of the saying from Heracliuts: " The barley-wine drink falls apart unless it is stirred ." I want to stress that I am not trolling, even though I don't necessarily believe that the moon landing was faked. I saw a very dangerous attitude portrayed, and I am merely making a point that it is exactly that dismissive attitude that has gotten us to where we are today.

It does us all a great disservice to dismiss intelligent people as cranks because they believe something we are convinced is untrue. I find it highly ironic, and potentially damaging, that people will see the kind of deception that we have all experienced here in the US, look at the fact that many people whom were dismissed as cranks were actually spot on, and say: "Well, you happened to get that one right, but if you think "X" then you are obviously an idiot or a paranoid schizophrenic.

Doubt is good, and doubt of those in power with no motive to be truthful and every motive to lie is doubly so. Perhaps if people didn't dismiss the people who warned us of this deception as cranks so many years ago things would not have deteriorated to this sad, in my opinion now irreparable state of affairs.

I believe there is a huge difference between a troll and playing devil's advocate as I am doing here.

I can assure you that I am no troll, and I have often been accused of being one by some of the most notorious trolls here on Slashdot, which should serve as further evidence in my defense of the accusation.

Hopefully you meant no accusation, but alas, the internet is full of those who are easily influenced, and so your statement is likely to sway them toward that belief.

That being said, I played devils advocate quite well if I do say so myself! ==bows==

Tomi Ahonen has the formula down perfectly, with explanations:

ELOP EFFECT = RATNER EFFECT + OSBORNE EFFECT

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/the-do-it-yourself-elop-analysis.html

Tomi Ahonen has the formula down perfectly, with explanations:

ELOP EFFECT = RATNER EFFECT + OSBORNE EFFECT

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/the-do-it-yourself-elop-analysis.html

We've already discussed this. Elop is the trope-namer for the "Peter Pinnacle", which means: 'to get promoted so high and to be so unqualified for your job that the company tells you that you can name your price just to go away.'

http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/08/25/1741200/inspired-by-the-peter-principle-the-peter-pinnacle

P.S. Tomi Ahonen makes a pretty convincing case that Elop turned gold into lead.

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/the-do-it-yourself-elop-analysis.html

Read a little Tomi: http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/

NOK was not even close to dead/dying when Elop was brought in. His 'burning platform' memo killed it.

So why were they so desperate to hire a new CEO? If that blog post is true and Nokia were in fact flogging every other player in the market why did Nokia change? The CEO does *NOT* have absolute control of the company, the idiocy of that post is in the idea that one guy just came in, took over a highly profitable market-leader with nothing but huge profits on the horizon and single-handedly took it down while everybody else was powerless to stop him.

Obviously an ex-Nokia executive doesnt want to admit that he had no vision and no plan for the future and would rather put the blame on one outsider. Nokia had some latent momentum but nowhere to go. His biggest problem is the idea that they were too big to fail.

Tomi has been following the decline of Nokia on his blog for years now. Here is his reaction to yesterday's new:

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/another-death-in-smartphone-bloodbath-windows-phone-strategy-so-failed-now-nokia-handset-unit-sold-t.html

Read a little Tomi: http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/

NOK was not even close to dead/dying when Elop was brought in. His 'burning platform' memo killed it.

Read this from uber Nokia analyst

Scroll down to
August 27, 2013
Ballmer Aftermath Part 3 - Ballmer replacement and specifically Elop? (Spoiler alert: Elop won't become MS CEO)

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/

I ask because to me, such exensive upgrades are of no consequence if tragedies like Katrina will still take place and get responded to the way we did.

And we clearly dropped the ball by exhibiting [our] sheer incompetence to the world.

Now Nokia which has contracts that leave it trapped with windows they are desperate to get some of the 808's shine back. They know that users who already used a Windows phone won't do it again

Now you've gone and destroyed the last shreds of credibility by linking to the blog of an exposed liar.

What I have seen is multiple attempts to portray him as a liar which turned out to be PR people propaganda. "Elop never said that.... oh shit Helsinkin Suomat had a recording; uhhh.. we didn't mean 'liar' just that he misunderstood". "no no, the operators love Skype. Oh that statement in the SEC filing, well yes, when we say 'love' we really mean 'love to hate'" and so on. I've seen things like "well look, the way he calculated the N9 numbers is wrong" coming from people who actually had the numbers and so would have just said something if the numbers he gave were too big. People are pouring over every word Tommi writes looking for something they can twist against him. After that, anyone who wants to claim Tommi is a liar needs to not only point to an untrue statement but to show hard evidence that he made it deliberately and that he knew 100% that it was untrue at the time he said it. There are even special slander sites (see the links provided by the astroturfing trolls in some zero scored other responses to my comments) set up especially to attack Tommi. If there wasn't much truth in what Tommi said, then the PR people would just ignore him.

I'm pretty sure we have discussed before and you are a legitimate and open Nokia employee. I'm pretty happy to agree to disagree with you since I'm 100% sure you are subject to a weird world of propaganda and no longer know truth from lies. This comment, however, is unacceptable and a clear part of a widespread smear campaign. That your comments are so similar to the astroturfer's is especially disturbing. My comment is either true or false. Who I choose to link to does not affect my credibility unless you show me that I should know he's liar (I do not) and that this particular statement is a lie (it is not; the links from Tommi's article are clear). If that were true you could simply show it and convince the others. Instead you choose to attack the messenger's messenger. As seen now, this can only be an attempt to silence a voice which is giving an uncomfortable message. Either point out the specific lies or stop this slander.

If your involvement with Microsoft is doing this to your ethics then please think about the old values of the company you loved and leave. Once upon a time the people who worked for Nokia were mostly good people. There are plenty of other companies out there where that is still true. There is no need to sell your soul for a pathetically small bit of Redmond's Danegeld.

What's wrong with the apps? OK, Instagram has decided to play nasty. Is anything of value lost?

Microsoft themselves have admitted to Windows phone being 18 months behind, especially in apps. This was even covered earlier on Slashdot. Go and look at reviews of Windows which cover the apps market; developers are simply not fixing or updating the Windows versions because there aren't enough customers to justify it. This leaves old buggy software where iOS and Android have the latest and best.

Samsung has been showing serious cameras that have phone functions, standard phones which have been outclassing Nokia in general reviews and real optical zoom cameras with most smartphone features.

So: 1) large, non-pocketable, cameras; 2) smartphones that the review you link to did not actually decide is better than an earlier Lumia model with a less capable camera. You are trying so hard it hurts. Surely you forgot the Galaxy "S4" Zoom? ;-)

Nokia traditionally lead in phone cameras and when the original Pureview 808 came out it looked pretty neat.

Right. And Lumia 1020 has improved on that.

Now Nokia which has contracts that leave it trapped with windows they are desperate to get some of the 808's shine back. They know that users who already used a Windows phone won't do it again

Now you've gone and destroyed the last shreds of credibility by linking to the blog of an exposed liar.

Aiming to sucker in camera users who they hope won't check app availability let alone how up to date the apps in the app store are is one of their better chances.

What's wrong with the apps? OK, Instagram has decided to play nasty. Is anything of value lost?

They know that users who already used a Windows phone won't do it again so they have to look for new audiences.

Nice post, but you lost it when you linked to a crap blog, which is rarely based on facts. http://dominiescommunicate.wordpress.com/2013/02/13/tomi-ahonen-has-decided-to-lose-his-credibility//

Not in my case. In my case it's a reasoned opinion based on corners being cut in the name of profit. Now I didn't know about all those but when a member of my government speaks up in favour of it, then I know there's something fishy going on.

Samsung has been showing serious cameras that have phone functions, standard phones which have been outclassing Nokia in general reviews and real optical zoom cameras with most smartphone features. Nokia traditionally lead in phone cameras and when the original Pureview 808 came out it looked pretty neat.

Now Nokia which has contracts that leave it trapped with windows they are desperate to get some of the 808's shine back. They know that users who already used a Windows phone won't do it again so they have to look for new audiences. Aiming to sucker in camera users who they hope won't check app availability let alone how up to date the apps in the app store are is one of their better chances.

MS and Nokia were already in bed talking about marriage. But it seems that MS didn't appreciate the new Nokia its vassal created.

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/07/nokia-q2-analysis-this-is-textbook-comprehensively-failed-strategy-in-numbers.html

Microsoft OS: 90 bucks or whatever they're charging
Smaller ecosystem for apps

Compared to:
Larger ecosystem by orders of magnitude
An OS that doesn't cost a dime (unmodded)

Going with Microsoft on this is corporate suicide and the stock price chart shows it.

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=NOK+Basic+Chart&t=5y

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2012/06/the-final-reckoning-of-burning-platforms-memo-damaged-nokia-by-wiping-out-13b-in-revenues-and-destro.html

--
BMO

Is there a web site with stats on the windows phone sales vs. Android vs. Iphone?

Yeah, here:
http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/
Bias warning: the blog's writer doesn't like current Nokia management very much.

Windows Phone has 4% global share. 85% of that is from Nokia. Nokia's margins on Windows Phones is -14%. That means it is not mathematically possible for Windows Phone to be returning a profit to the average builder. Nokia can't keep this up forever. Other builders don't sell enough units to make it worthwhile to continue to produce units. All of Windows Phone ecosystem sells about as many smartphones as Coolpad. Have you heard of them? No. Nobody talks about Coolpad, but everybody talks about Windows Phone and Nokia.

One fun person to read about these with is Tomi Ahonen.

Thank you for making up for Slashdot's lack.

What he said is true but it misses the main points. The main thing you need to know is that it's based on the Meego system that powered Nokia's last successful phone, the Nokia N9. Like most of the new systems coming in (FirefoxOS for example) there is no hope of it immediately catching up Android and iOS on apps. HTML5 is becoming the cross platform way to quickly get that range so that's what they always push.

Tizen is more than that; It's NTT DoCoMo's new main smartphone platform and since NTT DoCoMo is where much of mobile innovation starts that makes it important. As ever, the best analysis is he one from Tommi Ahonen. NTT DoCoMo was strongly into Symbian and pushing Tizen will be their revenge for it being killed.

Tizen can support QT apps so the same ones that will work on Sailfish and Blackberry can easily work here. Also Tizen seems to be source code compatible with Bada which has been very successful in the newer mobile phone markets.

Microsoft's little rape joke and the fact that this ever even saw the light of day shows a lot about gaming culture...

Tomi Ahonen pointed out in March that we already have 6.7 billion _active_ mobile accounts. This clearly means that we are already FAR past that point when you include all the devices not on telecomm networks.

BTW, in the same blog post Ahonen also estimated that the point at which active accounts would exceed the world's population would happen some time this summer.

M$ did cause Nokia to tank. That was done via Elop. The topic of Elop comes up often at Tomi Ahonen's blog. He is the most accurate mobile forcaster around and has on multiple occasions enumerated the damage being caused by Microsoft's Elop at Nokia. Nokia was at the top of it's game when Elop killed it. The Linux phone that he stopped was getting better reviews than the iPhone. But at this point there's nothing viable left and he's even brought in more people from M$ than just himself to ensure that the damage is permanent. Most of the talent has been fired or left on their own. If you want to look for progress, you'll have to turn away from Nokia and towards Jolla. That's just a sample of what the state of Washington can expect with microsofter in charge.

M$ did cause Nokia to tank. That was done via Elop. The topic of Elop comes up often at Tomi Ahonen's blog. He is the most accurate mobile forcaster around and has on multiple occasions enumerated the damage being caused by Microsoft's Elop at Nokia. Nokia was at the top of it's game when Elop killed it. The Linux phone that he stopped was getting better reviews than the iPhone. But at this point there's nothing viable left and he's even brought in more people from M$ than just himself to ensure that the damage is permanent. Most of the talent has been fired or left on their own. If you want to look for progress, you'll have to turn away from Nokia and towards Jolla. That's just a sample of what the state of Washington can expect with microsofter in charge.

IDC's forecast on windows phones for 2012 was only %238 off. Ref: Tomi Ahonen consulting

To further illustrate your point, about what would have happened had Nokia not adopted Elop's Nokia/Microsoft partnership, allow me to quote from the same source you cited have already cited, (mobile-industry analyst Tomi Ahonen)

This is the year Tizen will ship. Tizen at least initially will feature Samsung's top phones, so imagine the Galaxy S4 but running an evolution of what we saw with MeeGo on Nokia's award-winning N9. And the beauty with Tizen is the carrier community around it, starting with NTT DoCoMo which promises to start to sell Tizen phones in Japan this year. Tizen's launch will be seen as the perfect case study of contrasts, how can Samsung now, as world's largest smartphone maker and world's largest phone maker, with the help of carriers, switch from the world's most used smartphone OS (Android) to its new OS developed with Intel (Tizen). And the intention is to launch new smartphones in parallel with the existing system but introduce first Tizen phones at the top end of the price pyramid, as flagships. This is exactly what Nokia had in its strategy prior to Elop selecting Windows. Nokia, as world's largest smartphone maker back then, and world's largest phone maker, with the help of carriers, was intending to switch from what was then the most used smarpthone OS (Symbian) to its new OS developed with Intel (MeeGo). The intention was to launch new smartphones in parallel with the existing system, and introducing MeeGo smartphones at the top of the price pyramid, as flagships. And contrast that with what Elop did at Nokia - as world's largest smartphone maker, against the wishes of carriers, abandoned world's bestselling OS platform, forced change to the smallest, developed solely by the evil empire, Microsoft, known as the widow-maker of mobile who bankrupts all its partners. The new phones were not introduced in parallel but to replace Nokia's existing platform and the launch was not at the flagship, but in mid-price level. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong wrong and wrong. But yes, now we'll see how Samsung does it 'right' - remember, my dear readers, as you see Tizen phones and their reception and support by carriers - and think, this could have been Nokia in 2011 when the N9 on MeeGo launched.

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/03/preview-of-the-smartphone-wars-bloodbath-year-4-smartphones-galore-this-year-will-be-pretty-stable-w.html

It was a dynamic market, and they didn't see Smartphone Apps becoming the driving force.

There is only one diagram you need to understand (from this informative article to see that this is bullshit. When Steven Elop came into Nokia, Nokia's Smartphone market share was increasing . Nokia may have had a problem coming five years out, but at the moment they were doing fine.

The irony of this was that, if Elop had just left Symbian and Meego alone, he would probably have had a better chance of driving Windows phone to success than he has now. Just look at how current Nokia phones are a generation behind the competition in terms of weight and features and think how much better they could be if Nokia just had the purchasing power for decent components. Have a look at how the user interface of many of their phones doesn't feel like anyone ever tested using it. Think what a difference it would have made if they didn't get rid of all their UI experts who would have been able to identify and start to fix all the problems in Windows 8.

It was a dynamic market, and they didn't see Smartphone Apps becoming the driving force.

There is only one diagram you need to understand (from this informative article to see that this is bullshit. When Steven Elop came into Nokia, Nokia's Smartphone market share was increasing . Nokia may have had a problem coming five years out, but at the moment they were doing fine.

The irony of this was that, if Elop had just left Symbian and Meego alone, he would probably have had a better chance of driving Windows phone to success than he has now. Just look at how current Nokia phones are a generation behind the competition in terms of weight and features and think how much better they could be if Nokia just had the purchasing power for decent components. Have a look at how the user interface of many of their phones doesn't feel like anyone ever tested using it. Think what a difference it would have made if they didn't get rid of all their UI experts who would have been able to identify and start to fix all the problems in Windows 8.

It was a dynamic market, and they didn't see Smartphone Apps becoming the driving force.

There is only one diagram you need to understand (from this informative article to see that this is bullshit. When Steven Elop came into Nokia, Nokia's Smartphone market share was increasing . Nokia may have had a problem coming five years out, but at the moment they were doing fine.

The irony of this was that, if Elop had just left Symbian and Meego alone, he would probably have had a better chance of driving Windows phone to success than he has now. Just look at how current Nokia phones are a generation behind the competition in terms of weight and features and think how much better they could be if Nokia just had the purchasing power for decent components. Have a look at how the user interface of many of their phones doesn't feel like anyone ever tested using it. Think what a difference it would have made if they didn't get rid of all their UI experts who would have been able to identify and start to fix all the problems in Windows 8.

Did the submitter read this blog posting from an analyst first?

Detailed analysis of Nokia.

They say numbers about Windows 8 and Symbian, but what about Meego/N9? If a platform that they declared dead and buried basically at the moment of launching it, in just one phone, performed in a not so different way than Win8 phones, that would be a big message. There were some numbers around N9 sales for Q4 2011 and Q1 2012 that could point that it was selling better than Lumias, but not sure how it evolved. What is possible is that if Sailfish or Ubuntu gets ported to it (have a good shape for the swipe gestures used in those incoming mobile OSs) it could be even start selling back.

Anyway, speaking about dead and buried OSs, Microsoft killed and buried the Window OS bundled in most Lumia Phones when announced Windows Phone 8, saying that present and close enough in time Lumias won't be able to run it, and that apps for Windows 7.x won't be compatible with it neither. Is not so amazing that it sells badly, even for being a Windows phones. You had to wait till Lumia 920 to have a Windows 8.

Just check the graphs here - Nokia is but a walking corpse by now:

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/01/second-picture-in-the-nokia-destruction-saga-greatest-individual-management-mistake-ever-made-nokia-.html

Here's Elop

From The Seven Biggest Collapses in Mobile Handset or Smartphone History - this is part 3 in the Nokia Disaster analysis series

NOKIA - 2010-2012 - FELL FROM 35% to 5% in TWO YEARS - AVERAGE FALL 62% PER YEAR - IS CURRENTLY ENDANGERED SPECIES AS FALL CONTINUES
(Was ranked number 1 in market of smartphones)
Cause of death - Elop Effect ie Osborne Effect combined with Ratner Effect - resulted in instant carrier boycott and retail boycott against Nokia, these furher damaged by another Osborne Effect by Elop and yet another by Ballmer, and the purchase of Skype by Microsoft causing a Microsoft-targeted sales boycott

He's #1 in the mobile industry. #1 of losing.

...lets have a look at your waffle. First off gaming platforms xbox/ps3 are kind of small markets about 70Million give or take a few red rings of death. The Windows Market is 1.25 Billion.

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2012/12/latest-mobile-numbers-for-end-of-year-2012-this-is-getting-humongous.html On mobile phones "Gamers playing downloaded or networked games (ignoring pre-installed games that came with the handset) now number 1.2 Billion globally"

I'm not going to get in a discussion about what constitutes a gamer and what doesn't when your stupid point is your outdated notion that Windows is the dominant games platform. Its not true anymore, Hell it wasn't true the second Microsoft brought out the Xbox

I'm bored I'm going to play a little "Need for Speed Most Wanted" The top selling paid game on Android right now. (I'm actually doing Legend of Grimrock on Linux)

Perhaps you should just stop being fatalistic. This was entirely self-inflicted.

According to communities dominate brands by Tomi Ahohen, the poor N9 and the outdated Symbian are expected to outsell the great savior, the Lumia Windows Phone 8 at Nokia this quarter. Not too shabby.

I would keep the N9 on my resume.

Time to invest in Dell. If I've learned anything over the years of coming here it's that Slashdots are the most inept people at business trends.

Slashdot is a discussion group. Its probably why you have not registered, people with *different* opinions make opposing posts about the topic, where you are only capable of attacking people. Ironically in the context of this article is the Trend is towards Android and away from Microsoft, by every measurable factor, and is set to continue for years...those figures are not from Slashdot. In fact the current trend is Android will become the dominant the computing platform as soon an next year. Detailed Blog post http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2012/12/android-won-windows-lost-now-what-the-battle-of-the-century-is-decided-microsoft-relegated-to-ever-s.html its a fun read.

windows is fading out of relevance, but never let a lazy microsoft troll poo poo on the bashing of an irrelevant OS!

I wonder what trolls are going to move to in the next year or two?

http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2012/12/android-won-windows-lost-now-what-the-battle-of-the-century-is-decided-microsoft-relegated-to-ever-s.html

Its only slightly off-topic Tomi's latest article is about Android replacing Windows as the dominant computing platform http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2012/12/android-won-windows-lost-now-what-the-battle-of-the-century-is-decided-microsoft-relegated-to-ever-s.html but I like this quote which is relevant.

"Android will breach the rarefied Billion user club in just six months from today, by June of 2013. A Billion users? Only a handful of brands have ever reached that lofty level. Facebook, Skype, Windows, Nokia, Coca Cola, Visa and Mastercard."

That's not the party line, citizen.

Actually; it seems to be pretty much the party line. Every time we get any discussion of the various Windows 8 components someone pipes up and says "have you tried it", "if you saw the real thing" etc. etc. Every analyst house has completely overestimated the success of Windows phone 7 and Windows 8 in every way. In the same time when Tommi Ahonen was able to give accurate Windows Phone market share forecasts. Have a look at a almost any review; They say "it's great but the price is too high"

Microsoft should have charged $300, not $600 for the Surface (businessinsider.com)

"The problem is these things are priced way too high. Look at the history of tablet products priced above the iPad. Not pretty," he said today in a phone interview. (IDC)

"Microsoft needs hack a third off Surface RT prices and widen distribution to give the fondleslab a fighting chance to compete," [Forbes]

Look at the difference between an Android tablet priced for $300 and an Android for $600. One of them is a great value device with real compromises to bring it down to price and the other is a really great no questions device. You can't write a review which says "it's great but it's only worth half it's price". What you mean is "it's crap for the price and they should cut the price to a level where it's worth the money". The entire media is running scared of naming the pile of garbage that is Surface. Have a look at how carefully they never criticize the low resolution of surface; They always prefix with some Microsoft marketing statement; for example extreme tech writes:

Microsoft was at pains to point out that the Surface RT's low resolution (1366×768) doesn't necessarily mean

etc. etc.

Try to find one of the mainstream reviews which mentions that the surfaces resolution, at 148 PPI, is worse than almost any modern tablet. As a point of reference; the iPad has 264 PPI, the Nexus 7 has 216 PPI and the iPad mini has 163 PPI. The Google Nexus 10 with a 300 PPI screen is a completely different league. With a screen like that the correct price for a Surface is in fact around $250. You would have to go back to the very original iPad screen to find an Apple product with a lower resolution screen. The same thing repeats with mention of the terrible user interface experience - always gently skipped over or we are told "you can get used to it fast". Again with the app store, almost every review completely ignores the quality of the apps ported from iOS.

Have a look on any site with "consumer reviews". You will probably find more positive reviews than there are people outside Microsoft with tablets, and any review which reads as if someone actually used the product will be voted down out of visibility.

I think that the great thing is that consumers have finally realised that there is a Microsoft party line; have realised that that line is everywhere and that they are choosing to ignore it.

Hah. 3rd place in the mobile OS market is kind of like 3rd place in the Superbowl. They don't even get to show up for the game.

There's lots to back that up; the mobile market is a scale game and without the large number of customers on a platform it just isn't worth investing in new development. However, the mobile market doesn't quite work like a normal consumer market. The buyers in most countries are the big operators - not the end users - and they are willing to put extra subsidies into a third platform just in order to get more competition in future. Look at how desperately AT&T has been keeping Windows Phone on life support even at the cost of their own subscriber base.

In this case BlackBerry has additional features such as FIPS certification which guarantee it markets such as the military bureaucrats of the Pentagon. That means that they can actually become profitable with a third place and can probably get a decent volume long term.

The reason nothing like this can ever work for Microsoft is that sensible carriers hate Skype. They know that, if Skype succeeds then Microsoft will become the sole point of contact for customer billing. This will make the operators no more valuable than a WiFi access point whilst they have to invest in serious and expensive radio equipment to provide the coverage required by their licenses. Most operators can see that pushing forward Windows Phone would be suicidal.