Summary: Microsoft resorts to vapourware-inspired tactics in order to suppress an exodus from Windows Mobile to better platforms, mostly Linux based like the Nexus One/Android (shown above), Maemo, LiMo, Bada, and WebOS

Brier Dudley, a Microsoft fan from the Seattle Times, realises that Android (Linux) is the newest challenge on the block, so he is promoting the idea that Windows Mobile 7 is just around the corner. Here is what he wrote:

Google's Nexus One phone isn't as revolutionary as the buzz would suggest. It's basically a really nice touchscreen device running a new processor that supports slick 3-D graphics and services.

But its debut today still ups the ante for Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer, who is delivering the opening keynote at the Consumer Electronics Show on Wednesday night.

Microsoft is close to releasing Windows Mobile 7, the latest version of its beleagured phone platform. It's supposed to be unveiled at a March developer conference.

Not close at all! Vapourware talk is entering the debate again. Go on then, "freeze the market at the OEM and ISV level,” to use the words of Microsoft's Nathan Myhrvold. Windows Mobile 7 has been subjected to another major delay, as revealed by a Microsoft executive a few weeks ago (there was another major setback for the Xperia X2, which runs the atrocious Windows Mobile).

According to another new report:

Windows Mobile 7 definitely delayed to 2011

[...]

After speaking with multiple sources, we're now certain that we won't be seeing Windows Mobile 7 before World Mobile Congress in Barcelona in February 2011.

In order to "freeze the market", Microsoft will present something soon, just as it presented Vista 7 one year ahead of its release (to bribed bloggers and journalists only). This is an exercise in freezing the market:

It's official -- or at least "semi-official." The long awaited Windows Phone 7 is apparently set to be shown at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona next month.

The other source says that it will only come (in final form) one year later. This is typical. And since a Microsoft executive rules out the possibility of this being released in the first half of 2010, the former source ("multiple sources") seems more credible.

Technically speaking, Windows Mobile is a piece of junk. Even some of Microsoft's most ardent supporters hate it and complain about it openly. Here is a major Windows Mobile bug that we wrote about before:

• Windows Mobile Bug Dates Messages from 2016



• Why does Windows Mobile think it is 2016?



• Windows Mobile phones suffer Y2K+10 bug



• Windows Mobile Phones Receive Greetings from the Future



• The 2016 hit-list is getting longer

And guess what? Microsoft admits that not only Windows Mobile is affected:

Microsoft responds to 2016 SMS bug; not just cell phones affected

The saga of the Year 2016 text message bug continues. While there's not an official fix as of yet we, do have a workaround (download here). And we just received an official statement from a Microsoft spokesperson:

“Microsoft is aware of reports that phone messages received after 1/1/2010 may be dated 2016. These reports have not yet resulted in widespread customer inquiries; however, we are working closely with our manufacturing and mobile operator partners to investigate the cause and correct the issue as appropriate.”

Compare the trouble and vapourware from Microsoft to what the New York Times writes about Google's Linux-powered new phone (which Microsoft executives are already mocking in public):

Reader Responses to Review of Google’s Nexus One

[...]

The most plausible theory, though, is that Google's Android phone software is a more open and hackable operating system than the proprietary software on the iPhone,

This is why, despite the control from Google, Android phones are worth promoting. Google assists those who want to root their phones and even offers applications (in its marketplace) that require rooting. To iPhone, this is antithetical.

There is more to be said about the New York Times and Android. "I just finished reading John Markov's [New York Times] article here," said one of our readers and contributors who yesterday reported on the story about Android and Rubin.

"It validated a lot of my hunches about Rubin," he argues, "but there's a lot of Microsoft spin to it. Markov seems to have talked to Rubin. He white washed the Microsoft tension to focus on cell phone hand set vrs telco and presents Microsoft as a company no different from others."

“Rubin spent all of his savings creating Android after getting kicked out of Danger.”
      --Site contributorWe happen to have exposed Markov's bias before. He routinely omits Microsoft's blame when it comes to Windows flaws and he doesn't even mention Windows at all. Linux Today complained about this bias of his even more formally. At one stage he responded to Carla, the managing editor.

"A couple of interesting new things are presented," said our reader, "Rubin spent all of his savings creating Android after getting kicked out of Danger. There's also an interesting story about a robot at Danger getting p0wnt and Rubin being blamed for it.

"Microsoft spin is rampant. Markov misunderstands Magic Cap, which was dependent on networks and other computers for processing tasks which could be returned as results after days or weeks of working. Especially frustrating is Markov's misunderstanding or deliberate misrepresentation of the destruction of Netscape. It's my understanding that Netscape made its money on server sales, not browsers and that Microsoft ruined them by making IE non standards compliant and sabotaging Netscape, Java and a host of other better technology. Markov echoes the usual fallacy, "Microsoft successfully cut off Netscape’s air supply by giving away its Explorer Web browser as part of the Windows operating system," that paints Microsoft as a bearer of gifts." ⬆

"In the future, Microsoft wants Windows to run everything, from PCs to phones to cars to appliances. This is a terrifying prospect. If it happens, I'd be far more afraid that machinery everywhere would grind to a halt, planes would fall out of the sky, and civilization would crumble as a result of crummy embedded Windows design than any Y2K problem."

--Paul Somerson, PC Computing