Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Convinced That Windows 10 Will Be Its Smartphone Breakthrough
jfruh (300774) writes At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, handset manufacturers are making all the right noises about support for Windows 10, which will run on both ARM- and Intel-based phones and provide an experience very much like the desktop. But much of the same buzz surrounded Windows 8 and Windows 7 Phone. In fact, Microsoft has tried and repeatedly failed to take the mobile space by storm.
They can join BlackBerry in the "any day now, we'll be on top!" movement.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
It too me a day or so to remove the crap from Windows 8.1 to make it look like an actual desktop.
So windows 10 will, what, be just as broken as the desktop was in Windows 8.1? Or it will try to suck less and be less like a tablet experience?
At this point, I'm forced to conclude (from a week or so of running my new Windows 8.1 machine) that most of the decisions Microsoft has been making indicate they no longer know how to write a UI for a desktop, and they're entirely focused on writing only stuff for tablets.
They keep betting they're going to be successful on the phone Real Soon Now ... and they're so busy playing catch up they might need to worry someone is going to come out with the next new thing before they can put out a copy of what everyone else has had for years.
So the same experience on a Windows 10 phone as a desktop? That's based on giving you a crappy experience on the desktop.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
If this thing came out in a parallel universe where the iPod didn’t exist, it would be hailed as a god. No, the problem is the iPod’s head start — its catalog of music, movies, apps and accessories are ridiculously superior to the Zune’s
The Zune was cancelled shortly thereafter. The product finally became good, but it was too late. I smell the same fate for windows phone.
The iPhone when it came out was far less useful than any of the windows phones, but it took off because it cost more, and did less, while being pretty.
Nope. Multitouch was simply worlds better than stylus + soft or slide out keyboard.
"Visual voicemail" or whatever it was called kicked the ass out of dial-in voicemail which was still the default on windows mobile devices.
And the whole UI being designed for touch instead of stylus made it a LOT easier to use.
Yes, you definitely gave up lots of functionality in terms of the iphone not having stylus, and only being able to interact with it with your fingers; editing a spreadsheet on an iphone 3G was terrible compared to Windows Mobile 5/6... but making a call or appointment or sending a text message was orders of magnitude better.
Yeah, Windows has some penetration on low-end devices, but you know that's not where they really want to be.
Interestingly enough, Microsoft is now in the same position on the phone as Linux is on the desktop. They have an extremely competent offering, but they can't seem to really break though to make significant gains in the market. As we've seen time and time again with Linux, it's not enough to offer something "almost as good" to get someone to switch. You can't even compete with "just as good". You need to provide something that's significantly better than the competition in some fashion - some significant advantage that will compel people to move from Android or iOS to Windows phones.
In the article, Microsoft stated that a Microsoft phone would provide a "more consistent experience across smartphones, tablets, and PCs". Interestingly, that was exactly why I hated Windows 8 so much, because it was obviously a mobile UI bolted rather clumsily on top of my desktop. Windows 10 is unfortunately using the same "modern fugly" visual design, but is at least fixing the usability and integration problems. So, in theory, a cross-platform app store could end up being a win for them. If you can buy an app and run it on all three of those platforms, I could see that as being attractive for consumers.
Another possibility is if they provide businesses some great tools to help manage mobile corporate devices. Apple has been notoriously bad at this - not sure how easy it is with Android. But for consumers? I don't know. At the moment, I just don't really see how they're going to crack into this extremely competitive market.
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.