10.10.09
Linux Has Won the E-readers ‘War’ as Microsoft CEO Calls it Quits
Summary: In E-readers — like in phones — Microsoft vanishes as Linux grows rapidly
THE NEWLY-RELEASED Windows Mobile 6.5 is already a disaster and the Washington Post, despite its Microsoft ties, rips it apart and hails Linux at its expense. From the article:
Consider two new follow-on performances in the wireless-phone industry: One broadens the appeal of Google’s Android software, while the other cements the irrelevance of Microsoft’s aging Windows Mobile platform.
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The other, less impressive new phone development of the month is Microsoft’s Windows Mobile 6.5 — the company’s first big update to its mobile software since the iPhone arrived in 2007. You might think that two years would be enough time for Microsoft to respond to its new competitor, but you would be wrong.
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Windows Mobile 6.5 is a miserable mess. Slow, clumsy and ugly, it offers a few surface refinements of the iPhone and Android but little of their underlying elegance.
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With all these issues, it can be difficult to see many people wanting a Windows Mobile phone now. It’s even harder to imagine how long phone manufacturers will keep paying Microsoft for this software when Android is not only better but also free.
Android is now gaining in E-readers.
Reports indicate that another new e-reader is on the way, this time from Barnes & Noble. The interesting thing – or at least the interesting thing that makes this development connect to the search industry – is that Barnes & Noble’s e-reader will supposedly use Android as its operating system.
The dominance of Linux in E-readers is a subject that we covered quite extensively in this post, using heaps of evidence. Linux has become more or less a de facto platform for E-readers and contrary to reports from the past month or so, Microsoft dare not challenge Linux in this space. Here it is from the original source, Reuters:
Microsoft has no plans to develop a digital book reader to compete with the fast-growing popularity of Amazon’s Kindle or a device that rival Apple is reportedly developing.
If Microsoft does not address the amazing growth of Linux in devices, then Linux will grow upwards from devices to desktops. GNU/Linux is already destroying Microsoft's profitability between devices and desktops. █
