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So unless you've gone against the tide and used a Mac or some flavor of Linux, you probably
have a desktop or laptop running Windows, for better or for worse.
But how is it that Microsoft managed to be the dominant player on PCs, yet be almost
invisible on smartphones that were all carrying everywhere?
Well, believe it or not, it wasn't too long ago that the Windows Mobile OS was actually
the market leader on smartphones.
Wait, what?
Haha, yeah, about that.
So before the original iPhone was released in 2007, the smartphone market was a mishmash
of lots of different devices, without any real must-have models among them, and many
of them ran Windows Mobile.
So many, in fact, that Microsoft owned nearly half of smartphone OS market share before
Apple got into the game.
So what happened?
Well, even though Microsoft's presence in smartphone land was very significant, it was
still a company whose brand name was Microsoft.
Microsoft was bread and butter with software for traditional PCs, and their management
at the time wanted to be cautious about throwing themselves headfirst into mobile, skeptical
as to whether it would catch on.
As a result, Microsoft didn't devote enough resources to Windows Mobile, which quickly
became dated, while at the same time, Apple's iOS rapidly gained popularity.
Making matters worse, the Windows Mobile experience felt a little different depending on which
phone out of that mishmash of devices I mentioned earlier you were using, something that makes
a software product very different.
But hold on a minute, Android does this.
So why did Google succeed where Microsoft didn't?
Well, by the time Microsoft decided it really should be focusing more attention on the mobile
market, Android had already become widespread.
And not only was it technologically superior to Microsoft's outdated offering, but it
was also free.
By contrast, Microsoft charged phone manufacturers for Windows Mobile licenses, just like you
have to pay for a Windows license for your home PC today.
Now, Microsoft justified this because they thought Android was too bare-bones and would
cause fragmentation of the market.
Sound familiar?
But what actually happened is that it gave the phone industry a freely available base
that included tons of Google services that people actually wanted to use.
So in 2010, Microsoft, realizing the PC was losing ground to mobile devices, decided to
take its mobile competition seriously and replaced Windows Mobile with Windows Phone
OS.
But while reviews of the OS were actually pretty good, one of the main reasons for Microsoft's
failure was that by this point, app developers were already focused on iOS and Android.
So it became a chicken and egg problem.
There weren't enough Windows Phone users for app developers, even big ones like Instagram,
to bother to support the platform.
And it's hard to attract users without, like, a YouTube app.
All this came to a head in 2014, when Microsoft bought Nokia's phone division, hoping their
name and market power would give Windows Phone a boost and show the world, hey look, Windows
Phone is worth something.
It's going to be all over Nokia devices.
But this backfired, catastrophically.
There was still no incentive for non-Nokia manufacturers to pay for Windows Phone licenses.
Because now, not only was it not free like Android, but their Windows Phone models would
also have to compete against Nokia's phone division, which was now owned by the same
flippin' company, the one they were paying.
So in 2017, the Windows Phone project was finally put out of its misery.
And Microsoft is now focusing its mobile efforts on cheaper laptops, the Internet of Things,
and getting its digital assistant Cortana onto more devices.
So there may be an important place yet for Microsoft in this new world where it seems
like everything needs to be connected to the Internet.
But don't expect your friends to be impressed by your Windows Phone unless they also love
your dope HD DVD player and your lit flip HD video camera.
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