I thought windows phone was about being personal, if there aren't features that make it approachable for every user then It's not personal is it. Also why is Android on top then? It's a bloody mess that is complicated so many tech geeks love it however why is the average consumer using it as well if it's soo complicated?
Hey Colin
We're possibly using different terminology. I don't know what you're referring to when you mention a "feature that makes an OS approachable". In my view that is a bit of an oxymoron, because an OS with fewer features is usually far more approachable than an OS with many. An approachable OS is one that has a low learning curve, is intuitive, simple, direct and to the point. Overloading an OS with features/flexibility/options works counter to that. I wouldn't consider Windows very approachable, and neither is Android. 99% of users deal with those OSes "inapproachability" by ignoring most of their features, and developers try their best to support that (by hiding ignorable stuff behind "advanced" buttons, etc).
Anyway, yes, WP wants to be a personalize-able OS. However, not every possible feature you might think of furthers that goal. For example, features like VPN, eye scrolling, or a fingerprint sensor don't make a device more personal, whereas features like configurable live tiles, theme colours and backgrounds do. I
didn't say that WP
shouldn't become an even more personal OS. What I did say is that MS must choose a few areas where WP aims to excel, and personalization may be one of those areas. However, WP shouldn't try to be all things to all people, which is exactly what your "as many features as possible" approach attempts to achieve. That is what I'm objecting to.
Android is not the market leader due to its hodgepodge of features, or at least that isn't even close to being the main reason for Android's success. More importantly, MS won't ever win against Android by trying to cram even more features/options into WP. Why? Because like I said, 99% of people are already ignoring the majority of Android's features, and WP offering those people even more to ignore won't convince anybody. The only people who'd get excited about MS going feature ballistic with WP are folks like us, but even most of the tech press would turn it around and instead criticize MS for making "yet another overcomplicated computing device".
WP must stay streamlined and simple (which is in itself somewhat of a differentiator), but at the same time it must gain one or two
killer features that are easily marketable. Features only WP has. Something it does extremely well, and which a lot of people want. Those things must be highly polished and heavily marketed. Those signature features must be leveraged to give WP a personality, and everyone needs to know what they are. Like I said, it's about being excellent at one or two things. That will get more attention than being as good as Android in most things. This late in the game, even being slightly better than Android at most things won't cut it. WP would still be viewed as an also-ran.
That's why I say that at this point, WP needs to be all about the quality rather than quantity of features, and one or two of those features need to be really special. Without that, I don't see WP going anywhere.