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Microsoft Enters the Cell Phone OS Market

Posted by timothy on from the press-9-for-customer-service dept.

PuZZLeR writes: "Today, Microsoft unveiled a new operating system for mobile phones (named 'Windows Powered Smartphone 2002') and plans to fully enter the wireless data devices with voice capabilities by utilizing both cellphones and PDA devices. TI already created a reference design for the Ms powered phone. While this sounds like Microsoft is going after Handspring, RIM or Danger, cellphone OS manufactures, like Nokia and OpenWave are expected to counteract to the announcements. Today, Nokia announced it will offer mobile phone makers its own development kit and OS."

21 of 272 comments (clear)

  1. Neat! by zpengo · · Score: 3, Funny
    Hey cool! No more monochrome for me! Now I have this great blue scheme going on!

    Oh. Wait a minute...

    --


    Got Rhinos?
  2. Woo Hoo!!! We get viruses easier!!! by booyah · · Score: 5, Funny

    I cant wait till I awnser the phone and get

    "Hi, How are you? I send you this call in order to have your advice"

    Yeah!!!

    --
    #include sig.h
  3. what a name for a phone by vectus · · Score: 3, Interesting

    "Windows Powered Smartphone 2002"

    lol, why not call it "super-great windows CE awesome gnarly future-smart-phone 2002"

    I mean, seriously.. why not call it like "Smartphone XP" or just throw an XP at the end of a decent brand name (nokia 7100XP)?

    ok, I'm done my ignorant comments.. time to read the article and see how far off I really am.

  4. It will be way too big! by burtonator · · Score: 4, Funny

    OK.

    Most cell phones don't have that much data storage... right?

    ... but what about IE? IE can't be separated from windows so they will have an extra 20M there... ;)

    Right... :)

  5. Bil''s "Road Ahead" by Telex4 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    If anyone's ever read Bill Gate's book "The Road Ahead", this will sound chillingly familiar. In this book, he described how he'd like to see every appliance integrated into a central system (all of course designed by Microsoft ;-). This is just one more stepping stone.

    His vision, then, would be that you turn on your phone, log into the Hailstorm cellphone server, check your hotmail and sms in one, perhaps unfold your laptop running XP and download the messages, go home and turn on your TV running a microsoft-style tivo, put on your MS Stereo running off an XP music server, and so on. Total saturation, with total control from Redmond.

  6. Re:I can see it now... by alex_siufy · · Score: 3, Informative

    Actually, no. Nokia just announced their alternative to Microsoft's junk...

  7. Who cares? by mosch · · Score: 4, Troll
    Does anybody here really give a shit? I mean, honestly, for a site that bitches about MS so much, slashdot gives them a helluva lot of free press.

    Why not spend the effort advertising the Sanyo SCP-5150 instead, a very cool, full-feature phone that can meow out of the box, in addition to the normal wireless web, color LCD, blah the fuck blah.

    Or maybe we could concentrate on the Kyocero palm-phones, available for sale right this very instant, interoperates with all your stuff, and is a really cool phone.

    Let's stop watching MS pull out the same old bullshit, but with a start button, and start advertising products that matter, and don't support monopolies!

    1. Re:Who cares? by daeley · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I mean, honestly, for a site that bitches about MS so much, slashdot gives them a helluva lot of free press.

      I think it's more a matter of keeping an eye on what the 298.6-kilogram gorilla is up to. :)

      --
      I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
    2. Re:Who cares? by BlackSol · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Why?
      Because Microsoft is the (currently) largest commercial software producer. (yes thats a period)

      When the largest company in any name space announces a new product for a new product space its indicative a (possible) new trend in computing.

      So new trend + OS + mobile phone + applications = News for Nerds Stuff that matters.

      Also it may also encourage your stock picks on your 6 month portfolio rebalance. I mean I wouldn't bet on any comercial company in a product space to compete directly with microsoft.

      --
      $sig=$1 if($brain =~ /idea\s+(.*)/i);
    3. Re:Who cares? by powerlinekid · · Score: 3, Informative

      Actually this is slightly offtopic but IBM is the worlds largest software company, its just that while the software is commercial IBM's biggest customer is itself.

      --

      can't sleep slashdot will eat me
  8. Nokia fights back. by alex_siufy · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Here.... The short version:


    " Top-ranked mobile phone maker Nokia said on Monday it would offer other mobile handset suppliers a complete design kit for making Internet-ready phones, seeking to stave off a push by Microsoft Corp. into the mobile market.

    The move by Nokia, maker of one of every three mobile phones sold globally, takes aim at computer software giant Microsoft, which said earlier on Monday it was offering phone makers a standard kit of software and computer chips to build new "smartphones."     "

    The article also mentions that out of the top 5 mobile phone manufacturers, only Samsung is coming out with phones based on the Microsoft junk, at the end of this year.

    It'll be .NET (Microsoft) versus Java (Nokia) on the mobile front too...

  9. Apologies in advance by kill-hup · · Score: 4, Funny
    ..but reading the names on the "features" links:
    • You only need one hand
    • Small, but powerful

    just gave me a good laugh.
    It's been that kind of day, sorry ;-)

    --
    Sinepaw.org: Grape Winos
  10. Re:I can see it now... by PoiBoy · · Score: 4, Insightful
    And here's the best quote in that article:

    Of the top five cellphone manufacturers, only Samsung Electronics has said it would use Microsoft Windows-powered Smartphone 2002 software.

    From the looks of things Nokia has a decent shot of keeping Microsoft out of yet another business.

    --
    Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
  11. Re:Who cares? mod that up baby! by Em+Emalb · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "I mean, honestly, for a site that bitches about MS so much, slashdot gives them a helluva lot of free press."

    Amen brotha. You know why? More people love to bitch about MS that anything else. So far I have seen about 15 posts talking about BSOD's, Ctrl-Alt-Delete, viruses, etc...not a SINGLE ONE talks about the technology or the phone.

    sad ain't it?

    --
    Sent from your iPad.
  12. Semi-duplicate post? by Raetsel · · Score: 3, Informative

    Gee... if /. gets to post duplicate (but slightly different) stories, does that mean I have to repost my comments -- but slightly altered?

    I refer to this comment.

    I referred to better pictures of the Journada 928,

    And then went on to talk about the OS on it:
    • They also have an article about what has been added to WinCE [infosync.no] (guess I know why MS calls it PocketPC now...) to turn it into a mobile phone-integrated PDA. There are six (!) pages of screen shots in that one. You can also look forward to "...Mobile Information Server (MIS) 2002 Enterprise Edition, which adds Server ActiveSync..." -- here's ANOTHER pie MS wants to sell you pieces of.

      The interesting thing is that ringtones -- which phone companies want to charge you for -- aren't there. Instead, you can assign .WAV files as ring tones, and specific files for specific callers. Wonder what the motivation for that move is...?

      Still... I want one!

    Oh well... if they can cut-n-paste, I guess I have to as well.

    --

    "...America's great minds of today, teaching America's great minds of tomorrow. Poor bastards." -- A Beautiful Min
  13. Dear Bill by Introspective · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Hi Bill

    Just thought I'd drop you a line about the sort of things I would like on my cellphone.

    Some features I don't want :
    • Internet Explorer inextricably embedded into the OS
    • Visual Basic scripting
    • .NET, or .anything for that matter
    • Any sort of web server
    • Outlook, Exchange, or Hotmail
    • Buffer overflows
    • Passport authentication
    What I would like is :
    • to be able to enter a number and make a phone call
    Thanks,
    Intro.
  14. Re:Great Naming Again! by Drachemorder · · Score: 5, Funny

    At least they didn't base it on Windows ME and call it "Mini-ME".

  15. Re:My GOD! by jgerman · · Score: 5, Funny

    I don't know, will we ever see ANY news posted here regarding Microsoft and not have to wade through the hyperbole posts about how many cliche posts we have to wade through?

    --
    I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
  16. Linux based phones also in the works by micahjd · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Take a look at this: http://www.ridgerun.com/products/phone/tour/

    With software like Microwindows, PicoGUI, and Qtopia available, a lot of companies will probably be finding Linux useful on PDAs and smaller embedded devices like Cellphones.

    --
    -- 2 + 2 = 5, for very large values of 2
  17. Re:So now they want to kill Symbian by RickHunter · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Can't they just be happy with owning the PC desktop?

    No, because that means they must stop growing. Which means that they'll have unhappy shareholders on their hands, who might finally demand some of those dividends Microsoft has been withholding for years.

    And besides, as soon as they stop growing, they stop being a moving target. If they concentrate on owning the PC desktop, then they aren't integrating "new" products all the time anymore. And if they aren't integrating "new" products, then someone else could match their existing feature set. So the instant they stop trying to grab every market in sight, they're dead.

  18. Re:Phew by sharkey · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Hello. It seems you are trying to make a call.
    Would you like some hints on dialing your phone?
    Did you know that you can change the ring on your phone to 24 gratingly annoying, off-key tunes?
    To shut down your phone, please press the TALK button."

    --

    --
    "Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.