[psychotron]

I always somewhat understood smaller developers who feel that Windows Phone is not worth their time yet due to the relatively small number of users. Seems kind of reasonable in a lot of cases, I can see why they may not want to invest money and manpower into an app that's not going to generate much return on revenue or circulation. I get that. I also know many WP users who get a reply from a developer citing "lack of demand" for not publishing an app for Windows Phone probably feel a little like their platform is being discriminated against. I've felt that way at times as well, but my common sense always told me that the thought was ridiculous, that developers didn't have anything against the platform per se, it was just a logistical and financial thing. Anyway, I did feel that way - until today.

Today I received an email that proved to me that some companies simply don't give a rip about Windows Phone regardless of how easy of hard it would be to provide an app. See, there is an app that I shall not name from a certain company that I used extensively on Android. It's basically a portal to a service they provide, so they don't really make any money off of it anyway. When I first came back to Windows Phone I wrote an email to this company asking about it and, as you might expect, got a reply saying that they had no plans to develop one because there was no demand. Well, the funny thing is now I know they were lying through their teeth. Before they responded I had done some research of my own on the web and came across the resume of a young developer who had just graduated college last year. One of the things on his resume was that he had worked the summer of 2013 on an internship for this same company developing a version of their app for Windows Phone with a team of other interns. I was able to contact this developer who is now working full time for the company in a different department and he was more than glad to check on whatever happened to their project for me. He got back to me shortly after the company had responded to my email and said they told him that they had shelved it for the same reason they told me - "lack of demand". When he pressed the issue by telling them that he knew the app was complete and wouldn't require any work on their part, they really couldn't explain why they were holding it back and never deployed it. Just for grins I checked Google Play and the same app on Android has only gotten just over 3,000 downloads in the last couple of years. That's it. If they were worried about lack of demand they should reevaluate their commitment to Android as well. By those standards if they got only a quarter or even slightly less of that number on Windows Phone (somewhere around 500-700) which I think they could easily do, then I don't see how that wouldn't be considered a roaring success in relation to the number of Windows Phone users vs. Android users.

So, long story short, I used to believe that the idea of blatant disdain among some companies and developers for Windows Phone was a myth, but I don't any more. From now on every time I'm told by a company that we're not getting an app based on "lack of demand" I'm going to wonder a little.

[MicrosoftFoLife]

This whole post could be cut to a quarter of the size. Lol

[psychotron]

This whole post could be cut to a quarter of the size. Lol

Seriously? I can't believe you actually took the time to post that response. It contributes absolutely nothing worthwhile to the actual discussion. Why would you even bother? I mean, you're entitled to your opinion, but ...... wow.

[DennisvdG]

Sadly I've gotten used to this kind of attitude towards us, but what can you do? We just have to wait a little longer I guess :P

[DennisvdG]

Sadly I've gotten used to this kind of attitude from companies

[bionicgt]

I hate discrmiination :( not only I'm gay but also get this treatment... lol ...

[Guytronic]

Great thread in my opinion.

Even as one who is touting the WP whenever I get a chance which ain't often.
Disappointment abounds as far as "look for our mobile app" Windows is seldom there.

Ragged one local TV news service about the availability of a WP version.
I received an e-mail admitting they hadn't thought about that because no one had ever requested the service.
There still is no WP app available.

Sad state at this point ...

[Vindies37]

Its like a chicken and egg situation in my opinion... Companies don't develop since there is no demand... End users don't buy since there are less products/apps... So yup, who's gonna make the first move? Lol! Both ends are on a wait and see mode.

[dba415]

Its like a chicken and egg situation in my opinion... Companies don't develop since there is no demand... End users don't buy since there are less products/apps... So yup, who's gonna make the first move? Lol! Both ends are on a wait and see mode.

blame Microsoft for being late to the party. This is their fault.

[Zulfigar]

blame Microsoft for being late to the party. This is their fault.

Didn't know being first was being the last to a party. Interesting!

[tgp]

Why are stores built in town rather than out in the country? Don't people living in rural areas have the right to a store close by?

[forked]

I agree that there is some bias out there but I'm not sure your story supports it in that particular case. Creating the app is just the first step. They would still have to go through whatever effort it requires to get it into the Windows App Store (granted that might not be a huge effort). And, probably the biggest consideration, is supporting the application going forward. So there's the one time cost of creating it and then the ongoing cost of supporting it. It may be that the ongoing cost was not worth the return of releasing it (and the cost of creating it was sunk). Or, it could be that you are right and they hate Windows Phone :) Just thought I would throw out another plausible reason.

[bayanii]

Why are stores built in town rather than out in the country? Don't people living in rural areas have the right to a store close by?

[anony_mouse]

A couple of points:
- I'm not sure which country you are in, but for example, Windows Phone market share is 3.2% of *sales* in the US (not phones in use - that will be less as WP sales have recently grown), and Android has 51% of sales. If we assume, optimistically, 3% of phones in use in the US run WP, and Android runs on 51% (as its market share has been fairly stable), and the same download rate for this app as for the Android version, that would be 188 downloads, not 500-700.

- The cost of deploying an app is not just getting some student to develop it - of course, we don't know how far she had got or even if the code is actually usable. I have experience of this - believe me, code written by students is *not* necessarily useable. The app still needs completing, testing (probably on several phones) and debugging. Once it is in the market, it needs to be supported, updated, bugs fixed, etc. Even if the app is ready to release, these ongoing costs may be much higher than the initial development costs. Have a read about software lifecycles, for example this paper - http://is2.lse.ac.uk/asp/aspecis/20050005.pdf - it's a case study showing one example where 79% of total costs were after deployment (which in this case would be the release of the app via the app store).

[luis_banda]

sometimes it's very strange. For example, here in Per, Windows Phone is supposed to be the 2nd most used operating system (just behind android), but all the locals apps (banks, local governments, taxi companies, and so on) are made for droids and apples.

greets

[bionicgt]

I hate that they hate it, I yet have to see an app (regional, local app) for Windows Phone handsets in my country :(

[drram]

I had a security guy at an airport ask me "Wow, Windows phone but why". Not the first time though. My reply was that it was just a plain great phone - Nokia Lumia. Sleek and totally functional.

[Reflexx]

I hate discrmiination :( not only I'm gay but also get this treatment... lol ...

You think you got it bad? I'm a gay black Jewish midget Republican used car salesman.

[Reflexx]

I had a security guy at an airport ask me "Wow, Windows phone but why". Not the first time though. My reply was that it was just a plain great phone - Nokia Lumia. Sleek and totally functional.

I've been asked that. Normally I just say, "Because it's awesome."