I have read through numerous blogs with articles directed at Windows Phone 7 condemning it as a failure. For the most part, the general reasoning behind this so called failure branding is the lack of acceptance by the general public. Most of these people feel that because Microsoft has made *only* more than a half a billion dollars to date from their fledgling voyage into the 21st century mobile phone platform that the entire venture is a complete flop and should probably be scrapped. Now I am not a Micrososft fanboy by any means but I find this assessment flawed on various levels.
I’m not sure what Microsoft was going for with this mobile operating system, but as far as I am concerned what they achieved was a sheer masterpiece in fluidity, integration, soul, and beauty. Best seen on the Samsung Focus with its deliciously deep blacks and high contrast, the operating system is reacts like highly refined butter as the user slips and slides, flips and flops through page after page of marvelous simplicity with a gait seeming to be as effortless at the whim to perform each given action. There is no jerkiness, no crashing, no slowdown over time, no resets. Windows Phone 7 may just be the most flawless piece of software I have ever interacted with. It is certainly the best thing out of Microsoft since probably the .NET Framework.
So as I sit with my phone, gliding back and forth between the home and all programs menu wondering why I don’t have anyone else to share my discovery with, a person who themselves has discovered the miracle that is WP7. I begin to wonder what is wrong with it. Clearly, with the Mango update, windows phone 7 is on par with anything else you can get out there. Sure it doesn’t have 200,000 apps but, you know what, nobody uses 200,000 apps and chances are that any of the apps that you do use - the major ones at least - are already there. Furthermore, by virtue of the vastly superior development environment afforded individuals and companies alike seeking to build WP7 apps, I dare say it will easily eclipse that number in no time (particularly if the Mango version gets some traction).
Now people have blamed carrier sales associates, the "idrones", the lack of cut and paste, multitasking, and other such features for its anemic growth, but none of these seemed to be real reasons to me. I know, as an avid phone lover that what makes me *want* a phone has little to do with those things. I have certainly never been swayed away from a phone that I wanted by a salesperson so that’s not it is it? The fact is, even to a layperson, when you put up the Windows Phone 7 device next to the iPhone or Android it should be an easy sell. The the tag-line from the Redmond based company on that is, "when people pick it up and play with it they generally love it". Obviously this is not true or we would see better numbers from the device than we have. By my observation, people who "play around" with Windows Phone 7 might think it’s cool, perhaps even like it, but the phone just does not seem to sell itself like the iPhone did (and still does). Many of my friends see me with it, watch me play around with it, pick it up themselves and get a feel for it, but go for an Android device come contract time. This phenomena cant simply be explained away with lack of sales associate cooperation or incomplete feature set. Not when I literally have not been able to get one person that I know to switch over to Windows Phone 7! This observation is how I came to my epiphany on the matter of WP7: for a device that looks and functions like it does, the sales numbers are just right. Ergo, Windows Phone 7 is a success. Why you might ask? Simply put, 1% of the market-share is about the right number of people who would bet on Microsoft again after being screwed by them as recently as last year with the HD2 debacle. 1% of the market-share is about the right number of people who make deep informed decisions on purchases related to devices - individuals who have the disposable income to utilize, understand the obscure differentiating factors between the various phone OS makers, and are not swayed by the powerfull forces of mass conformance. 1% of the market-share is about the number of entities (business or individual) building apps for the platform who need a device to test on.
Microsoft may need to come to terms with the fact that creating the best anything does not necessarily mean that it will be for the masses. In the pantheon of computer software, great solutions have certainly not always risen to the top as one might expect. Each one is perfect in every way, but lacks a fundamental usability trait that forces it under the rug. For Windows Phone 7, that trait is the very UI that lusciously dazzles those of us that can consume the beauty of the Metro Design Language. To use the movie industry as an analog, how many great Oscar wining films are blockbusters after all?
Continuing on that analogy, I liken the iPhone to the first movie of a new and exciting genre, like the Matrix, like The 300, like Avatar. Not the best of the best by any stretch of the imagination, but so new, vibrant and well executed that it pulls people in en masse. Apple got in early, and now coast off the paradigm shifting work that they pioneered back in 2007. Because of this, and the way Apple deals with content on the phones, people who have made the investment with the iOS platform are simply stuck with it for the most part. The library of apps, music, movies, etc simply do not port over easily to other platforms. Android, on the other hand, is like the great summer blockbuster. What it lacks in depth and character it makes up for in sheer numbers. More money, bigger stars, more theatres showing it, 3D! Seriously, is there any other device besides the iPhones that don’t come in an Android version!?! And like the big summer blockbuster Android gives the people what they want. People who buy an Android device can expect freedom of choice in every matter that concerns their phone/tablet as well as the ability to express themselves and thier indivisuality through the device. If you are a tech geek, you can root your device or install new launchers, desktop managers, and even phone applications. If you are a newbee you can simply use the device in the standard way and still extract emense pleasure from the configuration options available to you.
In contrast, Windows phone7 is the art film discussed in the halls of Ivy League colleges, and literati soirées. As already mentioned, it is a masterpiece – to me. But you see, I’m an IT professional, I’m immune to the "idrone" rays emitting from Steve Jobs’ brain and I don’t like how jerky, slow, and downright unreliable the Android OS can be. But when I walk into the ATT store and look at the Samsung Infuse with that goldfish swimming around on the home screen in perfect Amoled goodness, and I hold it up to the Samsung Focus with its monochrome squares, I must say that I get sort of well... embarrassed. I feel like I’m wishing everyone would forgo the beauty of Windows 7 with its Aero UI glassy look for, well... DOS!
At your local Best Buy you will find that the situation is much worse. They usually have no physical devices on display, rather they provide a plastic mockup with an image of what the home screen looks like plastered on it. The mockups for Android phones brandish a wide array of home screens with different theming, background images, and widgets-galore; instantly instilling in anyone viewing them the desire to take one home and start playing. I want to add my friends to the contact carousel of the captivate, put my baby’s picture as the background on the vibrant Infuse, use the live wallpaper with the liquid touch experience on the Galaxy Tab 10.1. Windows phone 7? You guessed it, square blocks. Every freaking phone, square blocks. What impulse buyer is going to get that? What uninformed person will see that and say, “That one, behind the fancy flashy cool stuff. That one with all the red/blue/cyan/green blocks, give me that one.” ?!?
In closing I must say that I have concluded that the Metro design style, while a work of pure genius, is based on an incredibly flawed premise which we saw played out last year in Microsoft’s TV ads. Microsoft believes that people want to spend as little time tinkering with their phone as possible and this notion could not be any further from the truth. People clamored last year, "show what the phone can do in your comercials (iphone style)”. But it’s the phone and OS that wasn’t there – by design. What exactly would they show? Monochrome screen after monochrome screen flipping and sliding around. Looks great under your fingertips, but on TV, looks like selling the old Prodigy online service to someone with AOL.
