I've decided to dump my Windows Phone

I'm a rat abandoning a sinking ship. I'm not going to upgrade to Windows 10 so I might as well bid farewell. I like my current Lumia 928 running Win 8.1 and would be content if Win 10 was an improvement. But alas, it's not. MS is a bleeding giant that's slowly dying and wondering why.

They just got in to the phone game way, way too late, when there were already 2 heavily developed, entrenched app ecosystems and decided "herp derp lets make everyone write everything again for us cause we're The Windows Guys (tm)." Shot themselves in the foot.

Windows phone has been a shit-show from minute one. Welcome to the real world, I'm sure you'll enjoy it more here when you don't have to install leaked binaries to make Android apps work in what is effectively emulation just to patch the gaping holes in your OS's library.

silent-circuit said:

They just got in to the phone game way, way too late, when there were already 2 heavily developed, entrenched app ecosystems and decided "herp derp lets make everyone write everything again for us cause we're The Windows Guys (tm)." Shot themselves in the foot.

Windows phone has been a shit-show from minute one. Welcome to the real world, I'm sure you'll enjoy it more here when you don't have to install leaked binaries to make Android apps work in what is effectively emulation just to patch the gaping holes in your OS's library.

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MS was in the phone game long before Android or iOS. They managed to make enough bad decisions to thoroughly destroy their user base within about 2 years of iOS launching.

Ocellaris said:

MS was in the phone game long before Android or iOS. They managed to make enough bad decisions to thoroughly destroy their user base within about 2 years of iOS launching.

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Yes, but was Windows Phone (and I don't mean CE) a thing? Not really. Also, OS or not (looking at you Palm and Blackberry) if you don't have a solid app market there's no point continuing at this point, or for quite a while now.

If MS was smart they would have pulled a Sega, stopped trying to build phone OSes and hardware years ago and focused on getting Office and stuff like that on as many handsets from anyone that would run it as possible.

I decided to go with a Nexus 6. Not sure how this giant of a phone is going to work out for me but nothing ventured nothing gained. MS has lost my trust and I really don't think they give a damn about their customers. It's all an internal head game to them. We're just a necessary evil.

silent-circuit said:

They just got in to the phone game way, way too late, when there were already 2 heavily developed, entrenched app ecosystems and decided "herp derp lets make everyone write everything again for us cause we're The Windows Guys (tm)." Shot themselves in the foot.

Windows phone has been a shit-show from minute one. Welcome to the real world, I'm sure you'll enjoy it more here when you don't have to install leaked binaries to make Android apps work in what is effectively emulation just to patch the gaping holes in your OS's library.

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MS has been in the smart phone market way longer than Apple has so please try again...

They lost their considerable market share when they abandoned Windows Mobile in favor of Windows Phone 7. MS was on mobile way back in 2003 on a Dell Axiom well before Apple, let alone android, were on the scene....

They had at one point 25+% market share

Deadjasper said:

I'm a rat abandoning a sinking ship. I'm not going to upgrade to Windows 10 so I might as well bid farewell. I like my current Lumia 928 running Win 8.1 and would be content if Win 10 was an improvement. But alas, it's not. MS is a bleeding giant that's slowly dying and wondering why.

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Actually Windows Mobile 10 is a SUBSTANTIAL improvement over 8.1 but it is too little too late. Windows Phone 8.1 is what Window Phone 7 should have been.

silent-circuit said:

Yes, but was Windows Phone (and I don't mean CE) a thing? Not really. Also, OS or not (looking at you Palm and Blackberry) if you don't have a solid app market there's no point continuing at this point, or for quite a while now.

If MS was smart they would have pulled a Sega, stopped trying to build phone OSes and hardware years ago and focused on getting Office and stuff like that on as many handsets from anyone that would run it as possible.

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Read the wiki page, it's an interesting read:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Mobile

The year the iPhone came out Microsoft had 42% market share. They were never able to recover since then because smartphones blew up at that time. The main issue is likely that WM was not as touch friendly as the newer OSes. As far as apps there were a ton of them for WM, including some popular games at the time.

I'd wager that there were a lot of driving forces that caused such a significant swing in market share so fast. First was likely iPod sales were pretty solid at that time, so release a phone version of an ipod gave Apple a large user base from the get go. If the ipod didn't exist I'd wager iphones wouldn't have sold nearly as well. Second and probably the biggest issue, is that the general perception of Microsoft was not good. A lot of people were unhappy with the monopoly that Microsoft held on the desktop, and general user experience. Tack on the negativity of Windows Vista which was also released in 2007, and you gave people a pretty good reason to start actively seeking out the competition.

No one had an app store in 2007, it wasn't until the middle of 2008 that an app store came about. Apple and Google were both able to release app stores that year on phones. Microsoft being the dominate player would have likely been torn apart if they were the first one to do it because it provided vendor lock in and allowed them to control the platform even more. To this day people still are not happy about it on the desktop.



@OP: I know the feels. I loved my Lumia 928 but it decided to part ways with me after I dropped it and shattered the screen. I held out until the screen stopped working completely and moved to an iPhone. (Was hoping to get a 950 but obviously that's not going to happen) If you're still using a 928 then you might fit the same camp as me. I barely use my phone most of the time, but when I do it's for utilitarian purposes. I send texts, make phone calls, take pictures, occasionally look stuff up on the web, and tether to a computer to get work done. The iPhone can do all of those functions well enough and I'm not concerned about it going flaky on me like the previous droids I had. Even with it's small battery I'm seeing a 3 day standby time on it, so it should match the 928 for battery life. I would charge it overnight every other day, or every 3rd day on the weekends. If you're charging the phone daily and on it all the time, then the battery might become small quick as it seems like it goes down faster than a 928 while it's active.

Microsoft made mistake after mistake and it cost them everything. I had a Pocket PC long before the iPhone hit so for my first smart phone I picked up an HTC HD7. It was decent enough, but the web browser was pretty slow and the app selection was poor. When Windows Phone 8 was announced I thought it might bring some new life to my phone. And then they dropped support for ALL existing handsets, even ones that just came out. Windows Phone 8 isn't just a small update either, the entire core of the OS is different and new apps won't run on Windows Phone 7 devices.

That was handled so badly that it totally burned me on the Windows Phone brand, for my next phone I bought a Nexus 5, because it liked the Nexus 10 tablet I picked up to test Android apps on so much that I figured I couldn't go wrong. The Nexus 5 worked out so well, being perfect for everything I normally do with my phone/pda/music player that when I accidentally destroyed it I didn't even consider getting anything but another Android phone. I picked up a Moto X Play (for $350 CAD, an equivalent Windows device is $800+) and now that's my daily driver. And that's how I went from a Windows Mobile fan to an Android fan, I even used to develop free apps for Windows Phone for fun. I honestly believe that my story isn't unique,

Microsoft has done everything they can to alienate their core users so there is almost no one hyping their platform. Add to that the glacial pace of development and I can't see a reason to get a Windows Phone. Integration between Android and Windows (or more Google and Microsoft's web services) is so good it's not like Windows Phone has an advantage there either.

That Nexus 6 should be a good choice, hope it works for you.

It's amazing in retrospect how Microsoft lost their lead... Anyone remember the iPaq series? Crazy awesome especially considering that the only non-PPC option out there was really palm and they had just rolled out the IIIc.

You will see a lot of problems cropping up with the 950 and 950XL on forums. Overheating, Charging issues, Reboots, poor battery life. If I had to guess they were building these handsets almost by hand to get some out the door in time and they have some dire process control issues going on.

Rushed uninspired hardware running on a nearly beta OS... With the kicker being they expect you to pay $650 and then $60 for a decent back cover for the privilege. While at the same time making the value proposition that the device is better than their own $9 530, or $60 640. Please buy our high end phone that is SEVENTY ONE times more expensive than our other phone...

I did the same with my Palm Pre after seeing where Palm/HP were headed. Palm was in the PDA (remember those?) business years before smart phones, but they couldn't stay relevant and were associated with old tech. MS has the same problem since they've been around so long. Blackberry is next. Apple and Android came along as new players in a new market. Old players in a new market don't always succeed.

The Palm OS software was essentially ripped off once it was declared dead (do you like to multi-task and swipe away app cards? thank Palm OS). Great phone but fleeting app market. Once there are two giants, it's hard to make any progress.

gunbust3r said:

You will see a lot of problems cropping up with the 950 and 950XL on forums. Overheating, Charging issues, Reboots, poor battery life.

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Are you working for Microsoft as tester?

ryang said:

I did the same with my Palm Pre after seeing where Palm/HP were headed. Palm was in the PDA (remember those?) business years before smart phones, but they couldn't stay relevant and were associated with old tech. MS has the same problem since they've been around so long. Blackberry is next. Apple and Android came along as new players in a new market. Old players in a new market don't always succeed.

The Palm OS software was essentially ripped off once it was declared dead (do you like to multi-task and swipe away app cards? thank Palm OS). Great phone but fleeting app market. Once there are two giants, it's hard to make any progress.

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Palm might have had a chance if HP never had touched it. HP is basically a death sentence...

If LG bought Palm from the start, we might still have a few more Palm phones, much like Samsung's Tizen.

To me, Microsoft's fall boils down to two things: it just didn't 'get' mobile, and didn't take the iPhone threat seriously until it was too late.

Windows Mobile, like Tablet PC, was Microsoft attempting to shoehorn desktop Windows concepts into a place where they didn't fit. You were supposed to buy a smartphone because you needed to work on Office documents and check email in a familiar interface. First-party app stores? Media? Good web surfing? Who needed those? Windows Mobile had a big chunk of smartphone market share because that market was mostly confined to business users and early adopters, not because it was a good product. Apple was the first to have a truly touch-native interface and target everyday people

And when it comes the iPhone threat... I'm sure Microsoft decided it had to counter the iPhone the moment Steve Jobs left the stage, but it's still evident that Ballmer didn't take it seriously. Windows Mobile 6.5 was supposed to be the first proper response, but it was lipstick on a pig, a token effort to improve a platform that was fundamentally flawed.

Microsoft's reaction on January 9th, 2007 should have been "crap, everything we're doing is wrong" (hyperbolic, but you get the idea). Instead, it held out hope that the iPhone would go away and didn't even start work on Windows Phone until 2008. The hilarious bit is that Microsoft admitted that this was its first mobile interface targeted at the "end user" -- it hadn't even thought that people would want to use smartphones outside of business until Apple showed them. Where was that kind of consideration when Windows Mobile/Pocket PC was getting started, or at least once the tech was refined a bit?

That's not helped by Microsoft's perpetual unwillingness to treat mobile as a top priority. Even now, Windows on phones is still seen as subservient to Windows on the desktop. There's a small team working on it, and the interface is primarily designed for PCs. And then there's the horribly inconsistent phone release schedule: you have no idea whether or not there will be a follow-up to your phone in two years, or at all. If Microsoft were really serious, it'd be hiring hundreds (if not thousands) of extra engineers and pivoting its business to focus on phones. Hoping that its desktop monopoly will "naturally" spill over into phones didn't cut it in 2007, and definitely doesn't cut it now.

It's also pretty stupid and sad that Microsoft Courier could have reversed Microsoft mobile fortunes had internal politics (between Allard and that bastard Sinofsky) not gotten in the way. Allard and Bach made a complete product that is focused on touch. This could have been brought down to phone too. (Bill Gates, as great as a person he is, also isn't exactly the best person to ask opinions on what is hip.)

Microsoft's mobile comeback died the same day they killed the Courier.

CHANG3D said:

It's also pretty stupid and sad that Microsoft Courier could have reversed Microsoft mobile fortunes had internal politics...

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Same can be said with Microsoft and Ford. They could have rocked infotainment using low cost Winmo 7 OS and hardware but we got two iterations of janky Sync instead.

CHANG3D said:

It's also pretty stupid and sad that Microsoft Courier could have reversed Microsoft mobile fortunes had internal politics (between Allard and that bastard Sinofsky) not gotten in the way. Allard and Bach made a complete product that is focused on touch. This could have been brought down to phone too. (Bill Gates, as great as a person he is, also isn't exactly the best person to ask opinions on what is hip.)

Microsoft's mobile comeback died the same day they killed the Courier.

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That's really symptomatic of a broader problem that was dragging Microsoft down in the Ballmer era: the insistence that everything must be based on Windows. Courier isn't running Windows, even though it's better than anything touch-oriented we've done so far? Kill it. The Kin isn't running Windows, and a delay would kill its chances? Too bad -- rewrite the software from scratch to use Windows. Heck, the Xbox nearly got strangled in the crib until the team found a way to tie it into Windows tech.

You know how Ralph Emerson talked about a foolish consistency being the hobgoblin of little minds? Well, Ballmer was more interested in consistency than a good product. He was so interested in protecting desktop Windows that he didn't realize that Microsoft needed to move beyond the desktop... and, to a degree, Windows.

Aurelius said:

That's really symptomatic of a broader problem that was dragging Microsoft down in the Ballmer era: the insistence that everything must be based on Windows. Courier isn't running Windows, even though it's better than anything touch-oriented we've done so far? Kill it. The Kin isn't running Windows, and a delay would kill its chances? Too bad -- rewrite the software from scratch to use Windows. Heck, the Xbox nearly got strangled in the crib until the team found a way to tie it into Windows tech.

You know how Ralph Emerson talked about a foolish consistency being the hobgoblin of little minds? Well, Ballmer was more interested in consistency than a good product. He was so interested in protecting desktop Windows that he didn't realize that Microsoft needed to move beyond the desktop... and, to a degree, Windows.

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Good Emerson quote. In Ballmer's defense on the Courier, he was actually torn between Allard and Sinofsky. So he asked Bill Gates to make the decision. This is at least the story that has been outed. I dunno how much of it is fact.

Bill Gates killed it because Allard is saying that the Courier doesn't need an Outlook desktop app to do email. Allard is saying to let this be a casual tablet for artists and architects instead of a productivity tool for desk workers. Or something like that. And Bill Gates basically sided with Sinofsky saying that it doesn't support Office productivity software, most importantly Outlook.

Accord to Bach, the Courier wasn't a test product, but rather a finished product too. So it all comes down to Allard's "Windows" vs Sinofsky's still unfinished Windows 8.

Another reason that Allard is so unwilling to even add an Outlook app for the Courier is this: DELAY. Sinofsky was basically trying to delay the Courier by asking him to deliver on Outlook app support on Day 1, instead of later. Had Courier been a success, it would be a threat to Sinofsky. Sinofsky winded up getting let go anyway for his failures on Windows 8.

I would love for a person with more knowledge about the death of the Courier to write a tell-all book, or make a documentary video. Heck, we should get it funded on Kickstarter: "Death of Microsoft Courier Lives"

I dont blame you.

I loved my i-Mate SP5 rocking Microsoft Windows Mobile 5.0 Smartphone. Great handset.

Then my HTC Dual running Windows Mobile 6 Professional kept things real about the time the iPhone came out.

MS then sprang WP7 on us, blowing away the previous users and was in a rush to do it all again with WP8. The ecosystem never recovered from getting zeroed out twice in such a short period of time.

I cautiously kept my eyes on the Windows Phone environment but seeing 7 then 8 only alienate more users stayed away with iPhones and Android. As I am writing this I am currently on a 640XL as I finally thought the winds might be changing (wanted to see 10), but alas - Nope. I love the interface and core functionality, but it stops there. Ill be jumping soon as well. No shame in that.