“With the release of Windows Mobile 6.5 and its new Marketplace app store fast approaching, Microsoft has resorted to buying ads within iPhone apps to attract the attention of developers,” Prince McLean reports for AppleInsider.
Microsoft is “charging developers $99 per app submitted while killing off many existing WiMo titles and banning Java. Microsoft has reportedly approached some iPhone developers directly, offering them cash to port their iPhone apps to Windows Mobile,” McLean reports.
“In the most recent quarter reported by Canalys, Windows Mobile has fallen into fourth place globally with just a 9% share,” McLean reports. “Just a few years ago, Microsoft could claim nearly a quarter of the global market for smartphones. Now it can’t even claim that big of a slice of the American market. The US the market is now dominated by RIM and Apple, which own a combined 75.3% of the market. With its window of opportunity squeezing shut, new store rules that pinch off existing developers and crush competing stores are not likely to help Microsoft turn its game around.”
Apple currently has an “installed base of 50,000,000 devices for iPhone developers to reach,” McLean reports. “That has created a library of 75,000 apps, including over 21,000 games. It’s no wonder why Microsoft is working to get [developers’] attention.”
Much more in the full article here.
Heyyy Yooo Hooo Win Mobile over here!!!! Whatcha yu head, duck for low flying chairs.
There was a time when Microsoft crushed anyone in its way. These days, they can’t *pay* people to come their way.
Sad…
How did Ballmer react to the new Nano video?
http://tinypic.com/player.php?v=33lhtv8&s=3
Ya, I’ve got too much time on my hands right now. Waiting for HD clips from Fedex so I thought I’d play around a little with an MDN ad. Forgive iPhone reflection within vid – it won’t be winning a VMA award. (Although it is one of the best videos of all time lol)
Additionally, the Windows Mobile store can remote-delete apps: http://www.electronista.com/articles/09/09/16/win.mobile.marketplace.can.remote.delete/
It’s almost like they’re deliberately destroying any remaning market for Windows Mobile with these copycat decisions…
(…the iPhone/iPod touch copycat decisions described in the main article, I mean – the remote-delete functionality copies Amazon instead)
> Whatcha yu head, duck for low flying chairs.
Make that low flying deck chairs!
Microsoft’s core competency is leveraging their dominance. When they lose their dominance, they flail about aimlessly with clueless desperation moves while at the same time dismissing the threat that eroded their dominance. It’s a humorous mix of blindness, arrogance, and voluntary self-delusion about their invincibility.
What the stockholders of MSFT need is a completely new vision with completely new leadership. MS’ problem is cultural, which can only be changed by new blood at the top.
Balmer might have been sucessful in culling open source. But he’s stuffed when it comes to taking over great products…hahahahah
“> Whatcha yu head, duck for low flying chairs.
Make that low flying deck chairs!”
There’s an app for that
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Deus Ex stated the case accurately above. Stripped of its 800-pound gorilla status, Microsoft can’t compete on the inherent merit of its products in a level playing field. It’s the consequence of too much hubris and arrogance, borne of years of sleazy sales tactics that yielded boatloads of profit with little innovation, competence or usability undertaken on its part. Those days when the company could cruise to riches on an ocean of mediocrity thankfully appear to be over.
Who woulda thought way back when Apple introduced iTunes (was it 1999?) that iTunes would be THE KILLER APP that would bring Microsoft to it’s knees?
I love it that Mi¢ro$oft still have a ThiNg about Java, the nasty bassturds. Oh, Java was fine while M$ were messing it over with their J++ proprietary crap. But sue M$’s ass off for Java license violations and they get all crabby about it.
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The best part (if you read the article) is that the developer has to fork over $99 each time they submit the app! Even if M$ rejected it for minor reasons!
@G Spank
Great observation. I never thought of iTunes as a Killer App, but that it is, just like Visicalc was.
GSpank I remember when iTunes came out, a bit of software bought from SoundJam. At the time there were all sorts of music players out there, and different skins and ripping and formats just made it pretty obnoxious but fun as well.
Sound Jam was a darn good piece of software and Apple sure has run with it.
Yet, I don’t think of it as a “killer app” let the rest of the world think like that, I feel diffently on the whole topic.
It is more about love. I love good design coupled appropriately with engineering. This is something that one does not see that often, but fortunately it is there. It provides a synergy.
That is what I love about Apple, the intergration of the software with the hardware. It makes for a unified holistic approach.
Microsoft on the other hand, well it is a patch job, a byzantine system that is nothing short of a tower of Babel. Microsoft does well because much of the western strategy is based on that, short term gain that has a less likely chance of succeding when compared to an integrated approach.
The world will be a better place when WinMo dies completely.
Nothing ‘desperate’ about it MDN and you MAC lemmings. You really think you’re hot stuff with those Zune HD wannabe I-Phones, don’t you? So you have a lot of burp and fart apps. Great. Microsoft doesn’t want those.
What I’m reading between the lines is Microsoft’s push into mobile porn apps. MAC thinks their all high and mighty with their censorship of adult content which leaves the market to Microsoft. I have it on good authority that the first adult WinMo app is going to be called “Hot Cakes & Sausage” published by Dixie Normus.
Your potential. Our passion.™
Nice one, ZuneTang
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=:~)
Hey ZT,
Love that last post. Your best to date!
I’d buy a Zune HD for that app!
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I’ve noticed several headings lately that point to the wrong article.
Also, where did the ‘Comment’ button go? It’s been missing from my MDN app for a few days!
Microsoft would be better off making apps….
..for the iPhone.
snigger..iPhone. Get it?
bwahhahah. haha.
@Zune Tang,
Damn!!! Someone took my app idea!
Who would have seriouly thought that Microsoft could be THAT incompetant? You’d think with Apple on their tail they would be at least trying to lift their game and compete, but this smacks of disaster. I mean, the original Zunes at least in theory had a similar feature set to the corresponding iPods. But this Zune HD is dead in the water without an app store. Deader than the deadest Zune 16 or Zune 120. And Windows mobile looks like it will be gone in 2 years at this rate. This is a disaster.
The Zune has become the technological equivalent of the Ford Edsel.