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A Windows Phone 7 For Every Microsoftie
theodp writes "So, how can Microsoft guarantee its Windows Phone 7 devices will enjoy broader adoption than the ill-fated Kin? By giving every Microsoft employee a free one, that's how. A Microsoft spokesman confirmed the move, explaining that the idea is to thank employees for all their work, and make sure that they have experience with Windows Phone 7 devices. Microsoft has nearly 90,000 employees worldwide."
It's absolutely mind-boggling that Windows Phone 7 is missing some very fundamental features, like copy/paste, third-party multitasking, and universal search.
Absolutely mind-boggling you say? How about absolutely doomed?
In the past, competitors like Apple were lambasted by the public for not having such features, so you'd think Microsoft would take precautions not to repeat such mistakes.
You don't understand, Microsoft is adept at watching Apple do something right or make progress and then totally just think that they're different and special and therefore won't suffer from those problems.
What's worse, the rest of the smartphone world isn't slowing down, and with Windows Phone 7 not scheduled to launch till the holidays, the divide could get deeper.
It's called releasing a phone that's already behind the curve. So, unless you have a product name that causes people to hemorrhage cash regardless of the features, you're doomed. Like the release of the Zune. Except it appears Windows Phone 7 doesn't even have an exclusive 'squirt' functionality.
Criticisms aside, there's a lot we like about Windows Phone 7. The Zune integration is killer, and the core apps are much improved.
Zune integration is 'killer' you say? That's going to do it, huh? Well, everybody who owns a Zune now has the option to integrate it. All five of them. And the core apps are much improved? After suffering from the ailments of IE6 you think I want any version of Internet Exploder on my goddamn mobile device? You're insane. I don't care how refined it is.
We also commend Microsoft for being able to acknowledge that its old OS wasn't working and taking a chance on rebuilding something from the ground up.
Really? You're telling me that Microsoft owned up to and acknowledge its old OS wasn't working? I've never known Microsoft to tell their customers that something is wrong.
Long story short this product is doomed with a 97% confidence of certain doomage.
My work here is dung.
Windows Phone 7 isn't even real Windows CE. The user can't load and run apps designed for previous versions of Windows Mobile, only apps designed from Silverlight or XNA, and even then only from the official app store. Want to make your own apps? 99 bucks a year, just like iPhone. (To be fair, iPhone copied this app store model largely from Microsoft's XNA Creators Club and Xbox Live Indie Games.)
I'm sorry but this is a stupid statement and a stupid article. Apple gives a large number of it's employees an iPhone and Google gives a large number of its an Android phone. It's call "eating your own dog food".
In addition they get a friendly pool of testers who can give them instant feedback (and probably quite detailed given that they'll naturally try to use it with the products they are managing) on the devices in real world situations (such as bugs, issues, integration with web services, exchange support) and can also simulate some scenarios (such large scale remote activation, wipe and locate) far better than a couple of devices in a lab can.
Finally, if you're a manufacturer of a product, it doesn't look very good if your employees all use your competitors does it? Whenever I've dealt with a Samsung, Sony Ericsson, Apple, HTC or LG rep I've never seen them use anything but their own phones and I'd be concerned about the statement they are making if they did.
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Wow, this is the entire content of a +5 Insightful post.
Could you at least give us a single piece of technical evidence to back that up? However anecdotal?