Why doesn't someone at MS just refute all the "W10M is Dead" claims?

[Drael646464]

The negative press surrounding the never-ending "death spiral" of Windows Mobile/Phone has created such a toxic atmosphere around this platform that I don't know how it could ever recover.

But, one thing that I think would help would be if Microsoft would just flat out release a press release DIRECTLY addressing the headlines.

Why won't Nadella, Myerson or whoever just release a blog post stating in so many words: "Listen, stop saying Windows Mobile is dead because we have plans to develop it for years to come. We know we're in a moment of rebirth but from the ashes will rise a phoenix".

Or, is the reason they won't do this because they are hedging their bets? Maybe they AGREE it's dead and just want it to hit rock-bottom so that the miniscule .01% left using it won't be offended when they pull the plug?

This whole thing is ridiculous to me... The 5 straight years of negative press toward Windows Phone finally did its job.

Same reason Jobs didn't announce the iPhone. You don't reveal all your moves before you make them.

If you've got the creators update you'll see it includes "Phone" "Mobile Hotspot" and "SMS/MMS settings". Put that together with windows 10 on arm demo's last year, and its actually pretty darn clear what they are doing (ie scrapping win 10 mobile, and making it all just windows 10).

They've been pretty clear in their vision "one OS that runs on any hardware platform". Windows 10 mobile isn't that. It can't run desktop apps.

I just think they want a little shock and awe when they unveil it, and the device they plan to demo it on. I mean a windows phone that can run win32 apps, and things like full browser, chrome extensions etc, is going to be, in some respects ages ahead of other phones. In most respects current windows 10 mobile is behind other smartphone OSs.

It's also pretty clear Microsoft has been playing the long game and wanting to play leapfrog, with a lot of its ventures, HoloLens, VR, Cortana's skype bot integration and 'conversation as a platform", even Samsung and microsofts co-developed flexible OLED patent (BTW, they go way back, they do a lot of collab).

Microsoft don't want just "a phone". They want "all the next things". Wearables. The word I heard them throwing around recently was "mobile PC". I think that's what they'll call this new type of phone.

 

[aximtreo]

Has it occurred to anyone else that MS is saying a lot by not saying anything at all.

Remember the movie Shane? The last scene is Alan Ladd ridding off into the sunset and the little boy calling out "Come Back Shane" and he never did.

I think MS is quietly letting the Surface Phone ride off into the sunset with little or nothing said.

 

[Cosmin Petrenciuc]

In her yesterday interview for Windows Central, Dona Sarkar kind of hinted Microsoft's view of Mobile. She hinted that Microsoft doesn't believe the smartphones will continue to live for much longer. She said that staring at a screen that you took out from your pocket is unnatural. She said that at Microsoft they think that swiping, pinching, touching a screen aren't natural, human gestures. So they want to invent new mobile devices categories. Probably the next mobile device that will come from Microsoft will be able to make and receive phone calls but won't be a phone.

So Windows 10 Mobile as an operating system probably will continue to live but not on phones as we know them today. This kind of ambiguous message is exactly the one that Microsoft should stop sending. It is a confusing message. Microsoft should come out and say in a cristal clear message what exactly they are planning to do with Windows 10 Mobile.

 

[Ryujingt3]

It's like that Ronan Keating song which goes, 'you say it best [that Windows 10M is dead], when you say nothing at all'.

 

[DjeTe]

That comment from Dona was a little bit strange I think, even though I somewhat understand what she meant. But is driving a car natural, or flying an plane, many tech things is unnatural for human beings but we do it anyway. We learn and adapt. So will Microsoft avoid all things that are unnatural? Lets see that company disappear quickly.

 

[Drael646464]

That comment from Dona was a little bit strange I think, even though I somewhat understand what she meant. But is driving a car natural, or flying an plane, many tech things is unnatural for human beings but we do it anyway. We learn and adapt. So will Microsoft avoid all things that are unnatural? Lets see that company disappear quickly.

Hence why they are working on self-driving cars.

I think all she means is, there will be more natural ways to interact with computers. MS likely has some prototypes and plans here.

 

[PerfectReign]

I think all she means is, there will be more natural ways to interact with computers. MS likely has some prototypes and plans here.

I thought it an interesting comment. In other words, the phone as we currently know it as both Android and Apple developed it, will no longer exist. Something else will take its place.

At least she wasn't jumping up and down like Steve Ballmer did when he introduced windows 1 0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtuDS0ntaJY

Sent from mTalk

 

[Kimmo Toivanen]

In her yesterday interview for Windows Central, Dona Sarkar kind of hinted Microsoft's view of Mobile. She hinted that Microsoft doesn't believe the smartphones will continue to live for much longer. She said that staring at a screen that you took out from your pocket is unnatural. She said that at Microsoft they think that swiping, pinching, touching a screen aren't natural, human gestures. So they want to invent new mobile devices categories. Probably the next mobile device that will come from Microsoft will be able to make and receive phone calls but won't be a phone.

This sounds like natural voice communication with Cortana and/or AI bots. Or a tablet too large for a pocket (joke ). Cortana works currently in how many languages and countries? Can you chat with it?

When we think of mobile evolution from "dump" phones to "smart phones" (Symbian etc) and revolution to real smartphones, we still stare at screens that we took out of our pockets or bags and tap the keys with our fingers.

Microsoft can invent new and radical ways to interact with a device-that-shall-not-be-named-a-phone, but only time and adoption will show, how widely they are accepted. MS should win over existing Android and iPhone users - and that is hard. W10M did not succeed in that, quite the opposite with lack of devices, developers and apps. Continuum did not succeed in that.

 

[Drael646464]

This sounds like natural voice communication with Cortana and/or AI bots. Or a tablet too large for a pocket (joke ). Cortana works currently in how many languages and countries? Can you chat with it?

When we think of mobile evolution from "dump" phones to "smart phones" (Symbian etc) and revolution to real smartphones, we still stare at screens that we took out of our pockets or bags and tap the keys with our fingers.

Microsoft can invent new and radical ways to interact with a device-that-shall-not-be-named-a-phone, but only time and adoption will show, how widely they are accepted. MS should win over existing Android and iPhone users - and that is hard. W10M did not succeed in that, quite the opposite with lack of devices, developers and apps. Continuum did not succeed in that.

Have you heard of the upcoming skype bots Cortana intergration?

https://blogs.windows.com/buildinga...-skills-kit-cortana-devices-sdk-announcement/

Sure it will only work in English at present, but fortunately its a popular language

"The Cortana Skills Kit will allow developers to leverage bots created with the Microsoft Bot Framework and publish them to Cortana as a new skill, to integrate their web services as skills and to repurpose code from their existing Alexa skills to create Cortana skills. It will connect users to skills when users ask, and proactively present skills to users in the appropriate context. And it will help developers personalize their experiences by leveraging Cortana’s understanding of users’ preferences and context, based on user permissions."

Those are the bots added recently to skype. This intergration will basically create an "ecosystem" of "conversational apps" for Cortana, the same way we have apps for other ecosystems. Making Cortana a "super app", far more capable than she is now, or likely any assistant system.

If this is what she is talking about, we aren't far off, both the microsoft bot framework intergration, and the likely subsequent bloom of Cortana's true potential.

MS also purchased a machine learning startup that actually _understands_ word context. Deepest AI anyone has developed for actually understanding language, rather than being a complex parrot. I suspect MS is throwing quite a lot at this conversation as a platform stuff.

More on skype bots and Cortana -

http://www.theverge.com/2016/3/30/11332424/skype-cortana-bot-interactions-messaging

And the language context machine learning -

https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/13/m...tup-focused-on-general-artificial-intelligenc

Great thing about conversation as a platform, from MS's point of view - the existing cache of touch based apps is useless to an assistant. Everything has to be written for the machine learning and language paradigm - it's completely different. Having a great track record in one, means nothing for the other. Everything becomes conversations, assistant intergration, and info cards. Its sort of a fresh plate, a new battlefield. The person who comes up with the best system, will win that particular battle. And said conversational platform will exist in homes, smart watches, phones, computers, the works. It's also not a paradigm shift that is far off. Good bet IMO.