back to article Microsoft eases Windows Phone 7 restrictions (a bit)

Microsoft will unveil a second update to Windows Phone 7 in February, cracking open the operating system in an effort to put it on par with rivals. Company chief executive Steve Ballmer will detail the changes to Windows Phone 7 at the Mobile World Congress, Winrumors reports here. Ballmer is keynoting at next year's Mobile …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Halo

    @Bill: Either Retake Control Or Ship Runs On Iceberg

    HRH, the Steve of California was right: Make the salesguy CEO and you are doomed.

    Bill would know that a public C API is required. Salesguy believes his own .Net BS.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Horns

    The title is required

    So they're going from alpha to beta?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Gates Horns

      A long haul

      Yep. A step in the right direction. We have 5 betas to look forward then a couple of Release Candidates, then probably another couple of betas before we eventually get what would normally be an RTM. Still full of bugs though!

  3. Giles Jones Gold badge

    Android

    It may be on some tablets but Google doesn't recommend it on tablets.

    As for WP7 they need a USP, they probably have it in the sense of the Live services. But they really need to try to get XBox 360 owners on their side.

  4. uninventiveheart
    FAIL

    Riiight...

    "Belifore slipped on the safety vest of non-committal corporate speak to reply: "The company will evaluate that going forward." "

    And that's how Microsoft will leave the mass computing world... not with a bang, but with quiet "evaluation". Nothing Microsoft has released in Mobile/Tablet computing is an "overnight success" that they keep supposedly seeking. So far, I only see AT&T pushing WP7: does T-Mobile even advertise that they have them?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      right there on the t-mobile.com home page

      "Meet the amazing new Windows® Phone. See this and all the latest T-Mobile products and services"

  5. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Captain Obvious Consulting

    predication is that it'll do lackluster everywhere other than the US where it will do sligtly better and IOS and andriod will duke it out for top spot for phones and xPAD devices.

    Meanwhile M$ try to shove win 7 on tablets, rather than the OS they should be using, Bill had the vision but was c0ck blocked by his own team by trying to shovel windows licenses rather than a purpose built O/S.

    The year of the linux desktop will come to pass but it'll be andriod on tablets (once the price is less than rediculous) which will canablise pc sales and M$ will have to start to charge a realistic price and actually give the consumer what they want for a desktop O/S, something other than an exercise is marketing and turd polishing

    FAIL cos I kant spel

  6. Wayland Sothcott 1
    Gates Halo

    Unusual for Microsoft

    Microsoft became successful because of the fact you can run anything on Windows and Windows will run on any x86 hardware. The Sony Playstation became successful because someone figured out how to break it's copy protection. Android is loved because you can stick it on any hardware. Linux is more successful than Microsoft for servers because there are no license limits to the number of users. Microsoft are not in a strong enough position to go putting restrictions on mobile phones.

  7. R Cox

    12 handets, two carriers

    "Windows Phone 7 is only available on 12 handsets running on two carriers - AT&T and T-Mobile"

    How is this a hinderance. Apple sold 1/4 of a million iPhones in one weekend, one model, one carrier. By the time they added a second model and went worldwide, they were approaching twice that number every week.

    We must also remember that MS, unlike Apple, is not spring chicken when it comes to the Smartphone. MS announced it's first product in 2001. One can ask what has this 10 years of being in the biz gotten MS. Other oldtimers have respectable market share, RIM 15%+, Symbian around 40%, but MS remains in perpetual single digits.

    It is premature to say that the MS smartphone is a lost cause. OTOH MS is not announcing a sale of a million phones over the first month. That is only a half million per outlet and 80K units per phone. That is with the MS Phone as the main promotion on the front page of the ATT website. I cannot imagine how one can argue success.

  8. Arctic fox

    Hang on a moment....

    "But Microsoft is not helping its own chances. Windows Phone 7 is only available on 12 handsets running on two carriers - AT&T and T-Mobile"

    Firstly MS is the _os_ manufacturer _not_ a mob producer. It is for the likes of HC, LG, Samsung etc to decide how many they are going to make for WP7 and how frequently - and I do not think that 12 different high-medium to high end handsets in the last six weeks or so since launch can be described as amazingly slow. Secondly this is very US-centric and whilst America is without question a crucial market it is not the be all and end all of the smartphone market.

  9. Kevin 9

    Windows brand?

    Is it just me, or does it not make sense that microsoft keeps tying everything it does to the windows brand. I think that or the majority of people, the name Windows does not inspire happy feelings. More likely it feels like the thing that is probably the problem when their computer won't work. When I hear windows phone 7, my gut delong says buggy, security holes, and something that will only last 18 months.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Halo

    NFC

    Android is now in the lead with the addition of NFC in the Nexus S. NFC is key to the future of mobile computing. I think Bill Gates would have seen this key too but Balmer, as a sales person, just doesn't understand tech strategy.

  11. Mikel
    Thumb Up

    That explains why

    If Ballmer's giving the Keynote for MWC on 2/14/2011 he can't have actual dismal sales numbers for WP7 distracting people from the message of how wonderful the software is now that it's patched to include one of the many critical features that should have been included over a year prior in the first alpha, and the second patch in the indeterminate future may include another.

    He gets to stand up and say "we're happy about the slope of our uptake" and it's not a lie too much because since it started at zero, trickled into thousands in Europe and by then may reach hundreds of thousands of units total shipped if you count the phones MS and Dell bought their own employees, and that should be a good growth trend.

    He'll want to talk about the Millions and Millions that WP7 developers are earning - but if someone should ask what share of that is money Microsoft is paying itself for integrated apps and apps sponsored by their marketing efforts... expect him to demur.

    The only way that growth trend looks bad is if you cast it in the unfair light of iOS devices and Android devices, which between them should be moving 750,000 units a DAY by then. Or if you consider the half-billion dollar advertising commitment. Or if you consider the millions of manufactured units gathering dust in the unlit corners of the retail outlets or sharing warehouse space with the Kin.

    Apple plus Android should be trending to a million units a day by summer 2011 - on par with PC units shipped, and above PCs in gross margin dollars. And that would be why WP7 developers can't access analytics, or get paid for their apps until after the show. Simple, really. He can't stand up and admit that the war is over, and he lost.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    But i thought...

    "Microsoft needs to modernize Windows Phone 7" - i thought it was supposed to be their latest greatest and totally modern mobile OS? Maybe they dont need to modernise it, but just...do the job properly in the first place?

  13. Simon B
    FAIL

    No memory cards allowed = a no brainer

    Win Phone 7 does not allow memory cards, that alone wrote ALL win7 phones off for me, so I went out and bought something without Win7 on, AND has a micro SD slot.

    1. Dave B 1

      @ Simon B

      Likewise. That, disabling the ability to mount the phone as a USB mass storage device, and a few other things are why this devout WinMo user (of some 8 years, iirc) will probably never buy a Winmo7 device.

      Silly buggers.

  14. Tom Chiverton 1

    Parse error at

    "At All Things D's D: Dive Into Mobile conference this week"

    The hell ?

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Horns

    The only thing I like about corporate types is.....

    When their bureocratic bullshit bites them on the arse - because not only will the customers NOT wear the bullshit, they don't have to wear the bullshit - AND the competition has way better, way smarter, far more of it and for much longer.

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