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The latest All About Windows Phone Insight podcast, with discussions on Q4 results from Nokia, Samsung, and HTC; Lumia 900 availability; 60,000 apps in the Marketplace; Bing Maps; and the ZTE Tania.
Got to love the alleged view of the UK mobile networks:
Citing an “extremely reliable” source, [Professeur Thibault] first goes on to address the absence of a Focus S equivalent in Europe which is apparently due to carriers’ unwillingness to stock a device that looks so similar to the Galaxy S II. If there were ever a good incentive to not be lazy with design for Samsung, that would be it…and it really does look to have gotten to them. The source goes on to say the leading OEM is ready to release new models this year for Europe and that, “they should be beautiful”.
My emphasis, via Windows Phone Daily.
Paul Thurrott on the whole one hundred million dollars of PR for Microsoft and Nokia stories going around. This is why blogging rumours on top of rumours on top of guesswork to chase page-views really damages a lot of tech reporting online.
I’ve been sitting on this information for weeks so that Microsoft can make its big announcement at CES this coming week. But with these leaks, as with the equally inaccurate LTE leaks last week, I felt the need to set the record straight. The way tech blogs work these days is that any information, no matter how inaccurate, is simply parroted between all the gadget blogs and then, inevitably, to the increasingly lazy mainstream news as well. So let’s at least get it right.
Anyone following All About Windows Phone will not have seen this story in our news headlines, or in the “flow” sidebar of interesting links. It’s long been the rule of thumb at “All About…” that we don’t cover leaks, rumours, spy shots and similar topics. Does it leave us looking a bit behind the curve? In the eyes of some, yes, but we think it makes for a better experience and helps build up the trust between the writers and the readers.
Lots of gnashing of teeth in the Windows Phone world as the ChevronWP7 team, who provide a legal method to unlock any Windows Phone device to run homebrew software, announce they are halting sales of the unlock “token” at 10,000. The reasoning is simple, the contract with Microsoft is for a maximum of 10,000 tokens. It’s not Microsoft being evil, or pulling the rug out from under them, it’s old-fashioned logistics. There were 10,000 units, they are all sold, and the hobby team now have to decide if they want to carry on with a proven market, and all the support issues they need to take care of.
What would be interesting is if Microsoft would provide the same contract to another team to provide an unlocking solution…
Only Apple got there faster, but Microsoft’s new mobile platform passed 50,000 apps submitted to the Windows Marketplace. Lots of pretty graphs and more numbers from Rafe at All About Windows Phone (and more commentary by myself at Forbes).
Nokia didn’t get huge by selling the Nokia N810. They got rich selling Neo’s 7110.
John Biggs, in one sentence, shows the Nokia/Microsoft strategy.
In all the talk of the Facebook phone, a few sites have suggested that a Zuckerberg phone would be as much a folly as the Zune project from Microsoft. Of course the Zune wasn’t a huge seller in the marketplace (but it has many supports, myself included) but I would argue it helped Microsoft in other areas that are just as important:
A long time ago, I sorted myself out with a Zune HD – the final iteration of the Zune Media Players boasted a touch screen, an innovative new interface, a dedicated PC environment for syncing and managing media that wasn’t Windows Media Player, a music store and all you can listen to subscription model that took in the Zune HD player, the PC, and the Xbox home console – looking back Zune brought in a huge amount of knowledge to Microsoft:
Redmond an education that many have missed. Perhaps knowledge is Facebook’s goal, and not sales? More thoughts over on Forbes.
The latest All About Windows Phone Insight Podcast is live. Rafe, Steve, David, and myself cover:
In brief: HTC Titan reviews, ZTE Tania on SFR, Nokia at CES, Infinite Flight, Ministry of Sound goes free (for Nokia handsets), 40,000 apps, Google Search, Handy Safe, 4th and Mayor and MehDoh.
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Show notes on AAWP, The RSS feed also available.
Okay, Rafe Blandford’s projections actually have the 50K mark being passed in early January, but with a bundle of new developers and the general extra buzz thanks to Nokia’s successful launch of the Lumia 800 today (well, they would say that, wouldn’t they), I think that milestone is on before the end of 2011. And who would have said that was achievable at the start of the year outside of Redmond?
…the Windows Phone Marketplace has now passed the 40,000 app and games submission mark. Content is being added at the rate of 165 items per day… at the time of writing, 40,189 items have been published. Of these, 10,882 were added in the last 90 days and 4,770 were added in the last 30 days. These items come from 10,731 different publishers.
David Gilson (moonlighting at Blottr instead of the All About family), talks about the current state of play in the Android world with the linkbaiting headline of “Is Android Doomed?”
Google has to walk a fine line of not being seen to give preferential treatment to Motorola Mobility, in order to stop the likes of HTC and Samsung quitting Android. So far it’s been doing a good job, by means of helping them to fight its proxy patent war against Apple.
An interesting read…
It’s no British Airways, but I’d rather a better in-flight experience and a sightly above average mobile application (which is what American Airlines offer me), than a whizz-bang Windows Phone app coupled with the Edinburgh to Heathrow BA shuttle.
… it does the job of getting me relevant information while I’m travelling. While the lack of an updating Live Tile means you have to go into the application to find out the details, this app is more suited to checking on things as you travel to the airport to catch a flight.
More on AAWP - and I’m hoping AA manage to upgrade the app before I fly to SXSW in March (or just upgrade me)
We were always going to have an Insight Podcast for AAWP, and while there was the introductory one in October, and two specials from NokiaWorld, this week’s ‘cast is probably the first “true” Windows Phone podcast from the All About team.
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RSS Feed - Zune - iTunes
It’s either (a)
Gavin Kim moves from Samsung to Microsoft because it’s a better job for him, it’s better for his family, and he wants to try something new.
…or (b)
Samsung know Android is dead, that all the lawsuits will kill it, and we don’t want to be beaten by Nokia again, so why not drop one of our VP’s into the top levels of Windows Phone so when we do decide to switch we’ll get preferential treatment and not be left behind.
Gotta love some of the geekerati commentary this morning.
Part three of the All About Windows Phone video diary, and I turn the camera on to people who have never seen the Nokia Lumia 800 Windows Phone to see what their first impressions are.
More at AAWP, thanks to Mitch Cantor, Amber Osbourne, Tee Morris, PJ Ballantine, Angel Djambazov, and Tim Street.
Put phone in a video blogger’s hand, grab his camera, and see what happens…
