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Microsoft's Windows Phone Platform Is Dead (windows10update.com)
Ammalgam writes: Tom Warren at the Verge today gave voice to what a lot of other technology analysts and today definitively declared that Microsoft's Windows Phone platform is dead. This largely based on the abysmal adoption numbers released in Microsoft's most recent earnings report. Mr. Warren articulates the obvious by stating: "With Lumia sales on the decline and Microsoft's plan to not produce a large amount of handsets, it's clear we're witnessing the end of Windows Phone. Rumors suggest Microsoft is developing a Surface Phone, but it has to make it to the market first. Windows Phone has long been in decline and its app situation is only getting worse. With a lack of hardware, lack of sales, and less than 2 percent market share, it's time to call it: Windows Phone is dead. "
Now this news should not be surprising to anyone who has watched the slow decline of Windows Phone. Last December, in an article on Windows10update.com, Onuora Amobi also wrote off the platform. In this case, his analysis was based on the nonconformity of the Microsoft user interface to Apple and Android's widely adopted aesthetic appeal. He wrote "I believe Windows Phone is dead. Kaput. Finished. Over. Done. ... Windows 10 is successful in part because it's a return to Windows 7 in many ways and that's what made the consumers happy. One of the definitions of insanity is "doing the same thing over and over again but expecting a different result". This is exactly what Microsoft is doing and it's insane. Over 90% of Microsoft's desired audience like the look and feel of iPhones and Android devices. They do – it's not good or bad – it just is what it is. They spend their money on those two user interfaces."
Now this news should not be surprising to anyone who has watched the slow decline of Windows Phone. Last December, in an article on Windows10update.com, Onuora Amobi also wrote off the platform. In this case, his analysis was based on the nonconformity of the Microsoft user interface to Apple and Android's widely adopted aesthetic appeal. He wrote "I believe Windows Phone is dead. Kaput. Finished. Over. Done. ... Windows 10 is successful in part because it's a return to Windows 7 in many ways and that's what made the consumers happy. One of the definitions of insanity is "doing the same thing over and over again but expecting a different result". This is exactly what Microsoft is doing and it's insane. Over 90% of Microsoft's desired audience like the look and feel of iPhones and Android devices. They do – it's not good or bad – it just is what it is. They spend their money on those two user interfaces."
MS has already stated that they will continue to develop and support Windows Phone OS. This article is just fear mongering. The platform is not going anywhere.
They really have no other choice anyway. It would be foolish to give up on the platform because it can be used for IoT and tablets as well and it is also allows them to be more agile if things ever change. Not that I see them changing in the short term, but who knows, the pendulum may swing back into MS's favor in time and if it does, they will have the OS and infrastructure ready for it.
Anyway, I will continue to use a Windows Phone because I like the interface. The lack of apps is not a concern for me.
In addition, the fact that Windows Phone OS has such a low market share helps ensure its security as well since most malicious software and exploits will be developed for Android and iOS.
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
When the bloated shitware OEMs have been putting on machines becomes the bloated shitware shipped by Microsoft ... it's basically a sign that Microsoft is doing such a bad job at getting people to care they have to essentially resort to affiliate programs and paid product placement.
I'm afraid Microsoft has lost the plot so badly they will never be able to recover ... because for those many of us who simply don't want or need Office, and have noticed that while Apple adds stuff like movie editing software Microsoft is removing Solitaire ... there's not much beyond the OS to run other people's software on that MS brings to the table.
Except for notepad, Windows Explorer, and Calculator ... there's not a damned piece of Microsoft software which adds value to my home machine.
If the once biggest software company is reduced to adware, they'd jumped the shark so badly as to be doomed. Because they'll have almost stopped being relevant.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Was it ever alive?
I sit next to a box of Lumia's that someone bought for the school I work for before I started. They were only ever used as... well... phones. Nobody ever even tried to log in and use apps on them. And when I started two years ago, they'd not been used in over a year. Recently they were given to me as they'd been "sitting in a box" in someone's office collecting dust, and had been replaced with bog-standard dial-only phones.
My tech had one when he first started here - but he was 19 and naive. Within days of seeing what a real phone did (and not crashing his on-screen keyboard like his one did all the time), he changed his contracts.
The only other one I've ever seen was a teacher's at a previous school - who knew nothing about them and bought it because it "had Skype". She never managed to collect her email or anything else reliably and so never used anything that it could do.
That's out of literally HUNDREDS of adults that I know who come to me with all their tech problems, all the new-starters whose phones I set up with our email etc., all the parents and kids that I see every day about anything even vaguely technical. I must touch several hundred different phones a year, and the majority are almost 50:50 iPhone and Samsung, with the rest being cheap knock-offs and less common brands.
But Windows phones? Honestly? I've touched more Palm Pilots and Windows CE devices in the last year. And to be honest, they probably worked better and did more.
(Funniest thing ever was trying to get a WPA key into a WIndows phone where the on screen keyboard crashes, and then trying to modify the key so it didn't use the numbers that you couldn't get to, then finally getting it online and finding out that the "Update" button not only would never fix the problem, but also that it never actually did anything... it would download for over an hour, reboot, and be exactly the same... this was THREE MONTHS after the tech discovered that it was sucking up all his data trying to download the update and his phone company just wrote off the data charges the second he mentioned "Windows phone" because they were so accustomed to it).
This guy is an idiot. The platform is mature, and arguably, the best out there. Everybody I know who uses one likes theirs, as well. MS isn't going to walk away from this because of current fashion trends.
I don't respond to AC's.
There are fanboys of any platform that are always eager to make fun of competitors to their Chosen Idol.... so what exactly was your point there? Can't be due to any sneering by any top dog... currently it's a near-duopoly in the smartphone OS world, and fortunately neither major participant is run by a monopolistic player of dirty pool.
Microsoft used to have 2-3rd place in North America at best, back before the iPhone and Android came out (#1 was BlackberryOS, #2 was PalmOS). Microsoft *could* have taken advantage of a decent position back then, but they, like Nokia, Palm, and BB, were blindsided by the advent of first the iPhone, then Android.
Microsoft compounded its error in judgement by dumping time and money into 'Pink', thinking that a Sidekick inspired hardwired-keyboard phone style was eventually going to win out over the rapidly growing Apple/Android phones, who in turn were moving in the opposite direction (that is, Microsoft's competitors were busy as hell trying to cut down the number of hardware buttons, while Microsoft was busy adding more). In the end, the long-delayed Kin phone had no chance.
To try and make up for the fuckups, They send ol' Elop over to take over a now-ailing Nokia, then slowly drag Nokia into Microsoft's fold. Problem is, they did it about 5 years too late, long after Nokia fell into massive decline. They should have taken over that platform before it caught fire, to borrow Elop's analogy.
When Microsoft finally got its shit together, it was too little, too late. With a near-deserted app store, a widely-panned mobile UI, and a near-saturated market, Microsoft is in no position to do jack shit in this market... and I think the sooner Nadella gets the memo and pulls out of that mess, the better.
IMHO, the whole Windows Phone fiasco is prima facie evidence that Microsoft overextended itself. Excepting the still-no-ROI-yet XBox line, they have been patently unable to do anything profitable, let alone successful outside of their existing core competencies: OS, Exchange, Office, Active Directory, and rebranding Logitech peripherals. ...maybe it's time for Microsoft to get back to basics, keep the stuff that actually makes money, dump the rest, then sit down and take a long, hard, vision-related look at where they really need to go in order to thrive (and not decline or remain stale-steady-state) a couple of decades from now?
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Google (or Alphabet rather) is likely to overtake Apple's overall net worth soon.
LOL No.
Market cap, maybe.
But Apple has more than $200B in cash, while giving away about $50B a year in dividends & stock repurchases.
Apple's massive cash supply has a major problem that's going to take a lot of "financial engineering" to solve:
LOL.
Only if they want to spend it in America. But guess where they put lots ($10s of B) of capital into their manufacturing process. I'll give you a hint. It's in the Far East.
Well, this is a good point, but the real issue with Google's business model isn't collecting data your data per se -- it's that you don't get to find out what they do with it. If it were transparent it would be a simple and reasonable economic transaction: I get services from you and you get to use my information, and if I don't like how you use it I can go elsewhere for those services.
All the arguments for the optimality and acceptability of a market economy are based on the assumption that parties to transactions have perfect -- or at least good enough -- information about conditions related to that transaction. But an entirely self-interested party (as corporations are) will if given the opportunity hide information related to a transaction when it is favorable to them. This is one of the reasons we pay more for healthcare than other countries, because our system is rigged so that you can't figure out how much a medical service costs. This starts with the largely bogus Hospital price lists (called a chargemaster), which pretty much guarantees that self-insurance is not a viable option. But if you have insurance, nobody is ever quite sure how much of what is covered by that insurance. In theory you pay your copay and that's it, but insurance companies routinely dispute bills (which is why providers make you agree to pay out of pocket), I am convinced sometimes speculating that you will pay some of the amount they ask for.
People use "free market" to mean "unregulated", but in fact a free market that operates the way people assume a free market should requires regulation, particularly of information. I'd like the law to say Google has to give me an accounting of all the ways they've made money off my information, so I can decide whether the const in consequences to me is worth the value of their services.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I'd wager that the vision is there, within Microsoft's employee pool, but got hopelessly stuck in mid-management politics and infighting over whose shit smells better.
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
The whole "partner preinstalls" thing is why I was so disappointed with Android. I thought it would be a nice alternative to the Apple walled garden, and that either Google would force handset manufacturers to not preinstall crapware or at the very least would allow me to install a stock OS install like I can do with a computer full of bloatware. Then, not only did neither of those happen, but Google requires a paid license for the stock apps as well as access to their app store. And of course, the "real" versions of the apps (as in the ones you'd find on a handset, not the AOSP ones) aren't even open source.
Android had the potential to be something good, but they ruined it.
RTFA. I haven't checked sources, but it to expand, the article claims that even though Apple has a lot of cash, they have a lot of debt too ($53 billion USD). Apple took the debt to fund their stock buybacks/dividends and to avoid taxes (2.1% vs. lots of taxes).
If Apple brought their cash back to the US and paid their debts that would at least half their cash position. So they're not in bad shape by any means, but it's not as look as it sounds on the face of it.
Also, iPhone accounts for 2/3's of their revenue according to the article. If that's the case, Apple has said they expect a ~14 percent drop in iPhone sales this quarter. That's a big deal. It actually puts them pretty close to where Microsoft is at.
Alphabet, on the other hand, went and hired some wall street people, reigned in spending, reorganized and made some smart moves. They're on the rise.
The most valuable company thing I'm not sure about, I guess it depends how you measure it. Market cap does tend to be what the media and others are talking about when they say "the most valuable company in the world," but we all know there is a lot more to it than that. For example, market cap only represents outstanding stocks and is really all over the place.
Chance favors the prepared mind.
Perfect is the enemy of good.