I bought the HTC 7 Mozart from Telstra because it was the best Windows Phone being offered in Australia and had the best plan at the time I purchased it (during a pre Christmas sale) as well as using the best phone network in Australia (Vodaphone is having a lot of issues). The problem is, Telstra is the ONLY carrier in Australia who still hasn’t finished testing the tiny February Windows Phone Update which updates the updater. So I don’t think they’ll get around to releasing the March Update till mid to late April at the earliest (I hope I’m wrong). Microsoft shouldn’t be letting the carriers decide when OS updates go out, Microsoft should be saying, we’re ready now and allow every customer to upgrade at the same time if they choose. Windows Phone 7 is a very different OS to Google’s Android, all the phones being shipped with Windows Phone 7 software have the same hardware which is compatible with the OS without the manufacturer having to make major changes to it each time an update is released. Manufacturers and carriers also can’t modify or brand the phone’s UI other than through exclusive applications in the Marketplace so they don’t have to worry about checking or updating those either like they do on Android. The carriers say they have to test the updates to make sure they’re compatible with their networks, but I say that unless Microsoft actually makes changes to the networking stacks or phone’s radio (not FM radio, communications radio), then the carriers should not have any part of the process as the phone will continue to operate on their network in the same way (I mean, seriously, copy and paste could bring down the Telstra network?, of course it won’t!). I understand manufacturers might ocasionally like to update the firmware in the phone that could impact the carrier’s network and I can understand needing to test those updates, but they should be kept SEPERATE from the Microsoft produced OS feature updates. Anyway, I’ll keep an eye on this chart and hopefully it will be updated next week to show Telstra as either scheduling or delivering update.

So now to the happier news. There has been a article around in the last few days saying that Windows Phones are selling well in Australia compared to the test of the world! According to Smarthouse.com.au (http://smarthouse.com.au/Phones/Industry/E2T3Q8E6?page=1) Windows Phone 7 devices have a 3.2% market share in Australia, which while still isn’t all that huge, is actually 1% more than the rest of the world. The other big piece of information that I found this morning on the Sydney Morning Herald website (http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/mobiles/windows-phone-7-has-stronger-start-than-android-in-australia-20110324-1c7oy.html) was that Windows Phone 7 has had a stronger start here in Australia than Android did when it was first launched here. Apparently for Q4 in 2010, 4.4% of smartphone sales were for Window Phone devices. Again it’s a small win, but it’s little wins like this, which give me confidence that Windows Phone is going to be a serious player in the long run. I’m hoping that this news saying that Windows Phone devices are selling well in Australia means that Microsoft will prioritise finishing making the full range of services the phone can utilise available here in Australia such as the Zune Music Marketplace and Bing Local Search (see this article for more information).

One last article predicts by 2016 that Windows Phones will have a larger market than iOS worldwide. The article states that Android will be number one with 38.7% marketshare, Windows Phone second with 22.6% marketshare, iOS third with 19% marketshare and RIM’s Blackberry fourth with 9.2% marketshare. This makes sense, because Apple market’s their products at the more wealthy audience so having a smaller marketshare makes sense, while Android works on nearly anything and so has a large market it can attract. Windows Phone sits somewhere between Android and iOS in terms of market, so being between them in marketshare adds up. You can read all the details here (http://wmpoweruser.com/ovum-predicts-nokiamicrosoft-will-redraw-smartphone-market-overtake-ios-by-2016/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter)

The reason I listed Windows Phone 7 as a major competitor, even though it’s only 2 weeks old is because it’s a great OS that consumers will love because it’s innovative and simple, but also because Microsoft has spent a lot of time, effort and money ensuring that developers will flock to the platform. To write apps for the Windows Phone 7 platform, you simply need to download the free Windows Phone Developer Tools which include Microsoft Visual Studio Express for Windows Phone which is a development environment focused on coding, Microsoft Expression Blend 4 for Windows Phone which is a development environment focused on design and user interfaces. Also included is an emulator so that you can test your applications without having to have a phone. The language used to code a Windows Phone is mix of Silverlight XAML for user interface elements and properties and C# .NET for the actions that each user interface item performs. Also coming soon is the ability to program the actions in Visual Basic .NET instead of C# .NET. Games are programmed using the XNA Framework, the same language that is used to write games for the Xbox 360. So what this means for developers is that they can use the same tools they would normally use to write Windows applications and Xbox 360 games to write phone apps, without having to learn a new language or programming environment. Although currently the Windows Phone Marketplace doesn’t have a lot of apps, it has all the right apps. It has Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Messenger and plenty more coming soon. Microsoft is also working with developers who need special access to the OS (such as Skype and its need to use Sockets) so that their apps will be available soon.

The rest of the reason why I believe Windows Phone 7 will be a success is that it currently fills a void that is missing in the market. The iPhone was the first serious player in the smartphone market; in fact it defined the smartphone market. The problem is that it is a very tightly controlled platform. There is only one iPhone, it has one form factor, it is only made by one company, it only allows apps into its one App Store if they successfully make it through the strict application process and apps can often be rejected for the smallest reasons, you can only write apps for it if you own a Mac and you can only sync it using iTunes which is not a great program. It’s very controlled, which is a good thing in some ways because using it is consistent between iPhones and developers only have to target one OS and everyone generally is running the same version of the OS, but some of the control is just a bit over the top and anti-competitive.

Google Android on the other hand is extremely uncontrolled. There are multiple handsets with multiple form factors from multiple companies running different versions of the OS with different UI skins, multiple app stores (or manual install from a website if you don’t want to use an app store), you can write apps for it using Windows, OS X and Linux and do just about anything with it. Google simply writes the base OS and throws it out there to whoever wants to use it. This is good because it provides the user with choice, but it is also becoming the single biggest problem for the platform. Each model of Android phone these days seems to come with a different UI and also there are at least 4 different versions of the OS floating around that are still in use and even still available to buy. Lots of Android phones still on sale come with version 1.5 or 1.6 and many of these phones will never be able to upgrade to 2.1 or 2.2 which means they will always be inferior. Android users say, well just root the phone and install it yourself, but I can’t imagine my Mum or Dad rooting their phone anytime soon. There’s just too much choice for many consumers. The main reason that Android has taken off has been a lack of cheap competitor to the iPhone and also because there are many more models of Android phones available instead of the one iPhone. Having competition drives down the price of all Android Phones. What consumers really need is something in the middle. Something between the openness and chaos of Android and control and simplicity of the iPhone: That middle of the road is Windows Phone 7.

Windows Phone 7 will be available on a number of different handsets with different form factors (e.g. some with keyboards, some without) from a number of different phone carriers like Android is, but each handset must have the same minimum hardware requirements for CPU, memory, graphics capabilities and storage, plus they must have the same buttons on the phone (Back, Start, Search, Volume Up, Volume Down, Power and Camera) which ensures that every Windows Phone will have the same compatibility as the next one. This is a similar experience to what you get on the iPhone, every app designed for iPhone works on every iPhone. Windows Phone’s App Marketplace takes similar route to the Apple App Store in that you can’t install apps that don’t come from the store and apps that are in the store have to be approved first. Thankfully, unlike Apple, Microsoft’s App Marketplace rules aren’t draconian. Microsoft is also taking Apple’s route for updating the phone to new software versions. Unlike Android where it is the carrier’s responsibility to provide updates to the phone (and they very frequently don’t because they’d rather sell you a new handset), Microsoft will be the one controlling the updates and will make all updates available to all phones. Carriers can delay an update by one update cycle for testing if they wish (it is assumed that one update cycle will be about 1 month), but for the most part, updates will reach all phones as soon as they are released. This will mean that Windows Phone 7 will not become fragmented like Android and like Windows Mobile before it, they’ve learnt their lessons.

Finally, it’s important to address the problem of missing features. Windows Phone 7 is a version 1.0 platform (even though it has 7 in the name). It shares absolutely nothing in common with Windows Mobile. With nearly every version 1.0 platform, features will be missing initially. When the iPhone first came out, it was missing stacks of features. Many of the features most demanded didn’t appear until version 3.0 of the iPhone software. The difference between the way Apple and Microsoft have dealt with missing features is that Apple normally says, “You don’t need this feature, our device works fine without it and there are no plans to implement it” and then they’ll implement a stack of the missing features in a new version of the iPhone saying “brand new, you’ll find this experience just magical, so buy today”. Microsoft’s way of dealing with this is to say “We realise that this feature is missing, but we will add it as quickly as possible via a free software update and we’ll release each separate update as soon as it’s ready”. It’s a more honest approach and it means that you won’t have to wait for your new features once per year.

So all in all, I think Windows Phone 7 is a serious contender in the market because it provides the middle ground between Android and iOS and ultimately will be a win for customers. I plan to get one of these devices around Christmas and the New Year so I’ll be able to write more about the device then!

Anyway I knew all about the new iPhone, because it made top news this morning (more on it in a sec) but what I didn’t know was that the Windows Live Wave 4 Web Services have begun to roll out today, that was until I got home.

First I’ll address the new iPhone, I’m just not interested! Steve Jobs is a marketing genius who can sell people anything, especially things they’re never going to use or things that already exist or things that will actually be annoying. The big one seems to be the front facing Camera. Most smart phones (I know my HTC Touch Diamond does) already have a front facing camera, and guess what – I’ve never used mine and I don’t know many people who have used theirs either. The fact is, in Australia it’s too damm expensive to video call so what would you bother? If you’re going to video call iPhone to iPhone via Wi-Fi, then why not just use Skype on a laptop, which is the world leader for video chatting (or use Windows Live Messenger). Multitasking is actually good, looks well implemented, got to give Apple credit there, but iAds, oh hang on a sec… you’re trying to tell me, having pop up fully interactive ads in your apps is a good thing? I don’t want ads in my apps, I just want to use them. Every modern web browser comes with a pop up blocker, because we generally don’t like pop ups, so why would we want them clogging up our phones? One other good point, for the first time it seems that iPod Touch users will be allowed to upgrade to version 4.0 software (now called iOS 4) on their 3rd generation (and 2nd gen but missing features) iPod Touch for Free instead of having to fork out $20 or so. Apple peoples can download iOS 4 later this month and buy an iPhone 4 in July.

Moving on now to the news which I’m much more excited about, and the news which will probably gain an article on my main website once it’s all finished, Windows Live Wave 4 web services! The rollout has begun. I know most of you aren’t going to notice this yet, because currently Windows Live Hotmail and Contacts have not been updated (and most people I know only use Hotmail on the web, not the other wonderful services available), but everything else has. The new header means that you will be able to see at a glance on any page you’re on how many unread emails you have and how many of your friends are online and even start a conversation with them in the browser. The big thing for me though is that in Wave 3, Facebook, MySpace etc were all integrated into Windows Live, but they didn’t do much – this time, all the news feed updates from Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr and many many other services can be integrated into one feed that appears throughout Windows Live and (when the Essentials beta comes out) inside Windows Live Messenger). You’ll also be able to link up all your Facebook contacts with your Windows Live Messenger contacts (removing duplicates) and then chat to people through Facebook chat via Windows Live Messenger (which is awesome because I hate Facebook chat).

The other big one, is Windows Live Skydrive now has Windows Live Office – which means, Office Web Apps are here – WOOOO! Now these certainly aren’t fully featured (they’re a bit lacking actually), but when coupled with Hotmail when it gets updated soon hopefully, I see this as a massive time saver! Imagine getting an email with a Word Document attachment and editing and sending it back to the person without leaving Hotmail! It’s going to become a reality very very soon!

Anyway – I’ll leave it there, there will be a lot more in my article very soon, but I’m hoping you’ll all check out what’s currently available and realise there’s much more coming! Hotmail is NOT updated yet, so you’ll have to go to http://home.live.com/ if you want to see the changes!