Here's a rhetorical question: Can anyone describe 20 of the 500 changes made in WP7 Mango edition?
There's all this fanfare about how Mango is going to change Microsoft's fortunes, but I don't think anyone off the street could tell you what's going to make Mango better than the current version of WP7. In fact, I think the only distinguishing and differentiating feature in WP7, is those live tiles, and they're not changing much in Mango.
Yet Microsoft has decided to go all in, and place those live tiles into Windows8, as a selectable UI (turns off if you don't want it). I cringed when I saw that Windows8 demonstration on a 42" screen (below).
First off, touch screens that large are extremely expensive for the time being, so why bother baking in tiles into Windows8, when most people will probably have to turn them off? (No I get it, the live tiles are meant for the tablet market, for which Microsoft will be entering with must haste and full steam NEXT YEAR.)
Second, if most people can't make use of touch-enabled Windows8 tiles, ending up turning the tiles off, why include the function, adding bloat?
Third, those live tiles doesn't appear to turn people onto WP7; isn't this a poor risk, to further extend the live tiles into your mainstream OS product Here's a thought: even if they were relegated to 7 and 10 inch tablets, those live tiles suddenly are not so small, and seem intrusive and lacking discretion. Will you, for example, feel somewhat insecure when utilizing your 10 inch tablet with live tiles the size of your phone, for all the world to read quite easily, over your shoulder?
They (Nokia and Microsoft) say that Nokia's partnership will boost WP7's fortunes. But if they don't, it will seem somewhat silly for Microsoft to have pushed the live tiles onto Windows8. My speculation is, that most shoppers will opt for Windows7 downgrades, where we'll be reliving the whole XP-versus-Vista debate all over again.
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