Why Microsoft Surface Took So Long To Deploy

An anonymous reader writes "Nearly a year after all the fanfare unveiling a new touchscreen tabletop interface, Microsoft's Surface computer will finally appear in select AT&T stores later this month. Popular Mechanics tech editor Glenn Derene, who first introduced us to Surface in May, seems to have done a complete 180 in this rant, blasting Microsoft for being more obsessed with Surface's novelty as a magnet for image-conscious partners while messing up a rare hardware device — and, surprisingly, the simple software he was told came with it. From Microsoft's official excuse in the article: 'It's actually been a good thing for us,' Pete Thompson, Microsoft's general manager for Surface, told me. 'We were anticipating that the initial deployments were going to be showcase pilots using our own software applications on units to drive traffic. What our partners have decided is that they want to skip that stage and go to an integrated experience where they build their own applications. That's pulled the timeline until this spring.'"

Comments

Dude!

[Drakin020]

It's a big ass table!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZrr7AZ9nCY

Craplets

[sarhjinian]

This is why Apple's tight control of their whole ecosystem is a good thing: you don't generally see them putting their "partner's" need to shove content at customers above the user experience.

You can tell Apple's _customers_ are it's actual customers.** Microsoft's partners and developers are it's customers, and it shows.

Look at Windows Mobile: you get a reasonable platform that's perverted by hardware "partners" and their singular inability to write crash-resistant software, and then further mangled by the carriers, who seem addicted to penny-pinching revenue-ware.

Yes, it's "open" to developers, but as a manager of a fleet, the first thing I'd like to do is strip the device down to Microsoft's core platform, without the craplets the vendors see fit to add to it.

With Apple, you get a locked-down device. AT&T can't rebrand it (if they had their way, it'd be the "AT&T A7530", and it'd have six different ways for AT&T to sell me overpriced ringtones or web forms), nor can the Taiwanese hardware manufacturer load it with battery management software that misspells the word "Battery".



** you see this with free software as well, but the customer base isn't quite the same demographic as Apple's.

Testing...

[AioKits]

...I wonder if they tested this with anyone who owns cats. Mine jump up on the coffee table all the time. Does anyone know if this thing will pick up pets?