July 1st, 2008
Why Microsoft might win in mobile
Our good friend Big Money Matt is very upset today over Microsoft’s FUD concerning Symbian. (Picture from the Pepperdine alumni. Go Waves.)
It’s funny, sort of reminds me of what happened when Scott McClellan came out with his anti-Bush book. Symbian is the Scott McClellan of mobile software?
We’ve got to find a better analogy than that.
If nothing else the whole brouhaha lets me correct a misimpression I made here recently in defining the mobile Internet interface race as a two-front war between Apple and open source.
More accurate to say it’s a two-front war between Apple and everybody else. Everybody else in this case does include Microsoft.
Microsoft is currently on Version 6.1 of Windows Mobile, and if progress were this slow on Windows the company would still be in Albuquerque.
Suffice it to say no one has a mobile Internet interface that can really go toe-to-toe with the iPhone. (No, the RIM Blackberry is not a mobile Internet device, it’s a mobile e-mail device. As a browser I make it a raspberry.)
We’re all looking for a breakthrough on interfaces.
If that breakthrough comes from open source it will be shared. If it comes from Microsoft or RIM it will be licensed. If Apple keeps ahead of the pack the market will be Jobs’.
But we’re all starting from the same place here. Last place. It makes no sense to me for anyone to throw stones or play FUD games. It would be like the Padres and Marlins getting into a beanbrawl.
Those games are for winners. When losers throw at you it’s just a wild pitch. Let’s save the squawking about motives until we’re out of the basement.
Dana Blankenhorn has been a business journalist for 30 years, a tech freelancer since 1983. You can follow Dana on Twitter. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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| 07/05/08
