05-02-2002, 07:01 PM
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Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
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Them's fight'n words
http://www.itmatters.com.ph/news/news_05022002j.html
Business is business and Microsoft is unquestionably very good at it - sometimes too good for their own good according to the justice department. ;-) They are going after the cell phone market in a huge way - Smartphones and Pocket PC phones. Right now, Symbian is in their crosshairs.
"Recently, Microsoft's Juha Christensen invited the 20 biggest software developers allied to archrival Symbian to breakfast to try to win them over, much to the chagrin of Symbian executives when they found out. It is the latest stab below the belt in a battle that is developing nasty edges as the two companies fight to become the dominant software provider for hundreds of millions of future mobile phones and organizers that will be able to play games, music and video clips and receive multimedia messages."
Mr. Christensen is relatively new at Microsoft. He was hired in 2001, and was a Symbian VP at the time. :-) "David Levin, Symbian's new chief executive, ... 'called to arms' 1,500 software engineers to write programs for mobile devices that will link consumers and businesses." 1,500 developers? Isn't that a few zero's shy of what Microsoft has?
Let the war begin! The more they fight it out, the better the devices we'll get. Well, that assumes the North American cell phone system gets its act together, but that is another rant. :-(
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05-02-2002, 07:23 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Apr 2002
Posts: 109
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Them's fight'n words
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Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
Let the war begin! The more they fight it out, the better the devices we'll get.
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Not necessarily good for customers: Microsoft will start introducing its own standards in everything and interoperability will suffer.
There is only 1 way out: look, each symbian has Java virtual machine included. Microsoft and Symbian should make such agreement: Microsoft will add JVM to EVERY PocketPC and EVERY MS Smartphone and Symbian will add .NET Compact Framework to every Symbian based phone (it should be a part of OS as Java is now). In this way we could see real interoperability and competition on open terms...
Bad idea?
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05-02-2002, 07:39 PM
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Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
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Didn't MS try that with Sun and Java once?
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05-02-2002, 07:45 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Apr 2002
Posts: 109
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
Didn't MS try that with Sun and Java once?
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Sun is a puny, disgusting company. But Symbian has backing of super-corporations like major cell phone vendors. It is different...
Well, maybe after all Microsoft could kill Symbian just by releasing .NET Compact Framework for Symbian as an add-on! The problem is that Java is owned by a puny, sh*tty company (Sun) and that Symbian has nothing like .NET CF to offer to trade - so Java seems to be the only such thing...
By the way, it is a good startup idea: the company that would make .NET CF for Symbian would be bought by Microsoft by any price! Hah, hah, ...
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05-02-2002, 08:32 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,177
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Quote:
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Microsoft will start introducing its own standards in everything and interoperability will suffer.
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If anything, Microsoft brings to this hurting, needing cell phone market OPEN standards: true Internet support in the shape of IP, HTTP, HTML, XML etc. Symbian, and the companies therein, has during all these years just brought us CLOSED, proprietary products that are not even compliant with each other let alone Internet standards.
In the mobile devices market, Microsoft means, brings and supports the Internet.[/quote]
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05-02-2002, 08:37 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Apr 2002
Posts: 109
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Andy Sjostrom
In the mobile devices market, Microsoft means, brings and supports the Internet.
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I neither care nore I am interested in some abstract "Internet", I am interested in mobile execution environemnts connected to wireless networks. Internet is not everything, services like MMS, local based, etc could become more important.
Anyway: I am right now downloading .NET CF (94.7 MB total, 25.1 MB remaining) so I will see myself very soon how it looks like...
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05-02-2002, 08:38 PM
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Magi
Join Date: Sep 2005
Posts: 2,341
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Them's fight'n words
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
Well, that assumes the North American cell phone system gets its act together, but that is another rant. :-(
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That I think, Ed, is the most significant statement of your post. Man, what a mess the cellular systems are here in North America. Hopefully either GPRS/GSM or CDMA 1Xrtt will become the norm making a unified standard, and at a price that is exceptable.
Dave
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05-02-2002, 08:51 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,177
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Internet is not abstract. It is for real. The only players that try to turn the Internet into something abstract are mobile network operators (although some of them are re-positioning) and most cell phone manufacturers (read Symbian). The "Mobile Internet"-hype is going down the same tube WAP did.
MMS is a nice thought. I totally agree with the idea of being able to easily send multimedia content to and from mobile devices, even simple cell phones. But MMS will eventually die unless it sits on the Internet. Same with location based services.
I am glad, however, to see that some cell phone makers and mobile network operators are coming to senses. Clearly it is so that Microsoft's golden offering to all players in this market is mobile access to the Internet.
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05-02-2002, 09:41 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Apr 2002
Posts: 109
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Them's fight'n words
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
The more they fight it out, the better the devices we'll get.
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Oh, men, not the devices but SOFTWARE is most important.
I have just completed download of .NET Compact Framework SDK but it requires me to have Visual C# .NET to be installed - so I ordered it but it costs over 100 USD so is not for free.
For now result of the game is: ".NET CF" : "wireless Java" => 0 : 1.
Wireless Java SDK is for free and for .NET CF you need to spend at least 100 USD, guess which platform will have more developers?
Anybody already running/developing with .NET CF or I am first here?
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05-02-2002, 10:09 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Apr 2002
Posts: 69
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The major handset manufacturers have circled the wagons around Symbian, effectively keeping Microsoft out (I think it's almost as much a cultural thing as a money issue).
They (MS) have been left with the crumbs of Sendo and Samsung (the latter maybe not so much a "crumb"). They've got some real work ahead of them. What's more, at least we know Symbian handsets work and are more or less rock solid stable. Who know's about Smartphone? Here's hoping it's a far cry better than PPC 2002.
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