Microsoft is dangling prizes to entice developers for slap together some applications for the company’s cheap, uncool customers who’ve shortsightedly saddled themselves with underpowered, laughably-outclassed Windows Mobile devices that offer myriad screen sizes, untold hardware configurations, and an OS that only Steve Ballmer could pretend to love.
Developers who are desperate enough to submit their little slapdash programs to Microsoft’s “Windows Marketplace for Mobile” are eligible to win what Microsoft calls the “Race to Market Challenge” (remember folks, as usual, it’s a mad rush to catch up to Apple, so forget about quality; hurry up!). “Winning” could net the developer a “prize,” including:
• One (1) Microsoft Big Ass Table: So hapless WinMo developers can get a faraway glimpse of what real mobile developers all have in their pockets in a convenient 9-ton coffee table; optional carrying cart with trailer hitch sold separately.
• Online marketing and promotion: Ooh, goody! A sample: “This is Lauren. She’s too stupid to get a real phone. (Lauren) ‘Let’s go to the iPhone store. I’m not cool enough or smart enough to think more than 15 seconds ahead. Where’s the hair dye; “Unnatural Crimson,” please? Uh, I mean (reads off-camera): ‘$800. for. an. iPhone?! This. L.G. phone. looks. like. the. same. thing… Good. enough.’ We told Lauren, ‘You bought it. You’re stuck with it. Dumbass.'”
• A one-of-a-kind trophy: No, we’re not kidding. Microsoft claims to have actually had some sort of trophy made up; their own mini-monument to stupidity. Unfortunately they don’t show the thing on their site, but we do have an “artist’s” conception on the left.
More info via Microsoft’s “Race to Market Chalenge” site here.
