Look around the table. If you don't see a sucker, get up, because you're the sucker - Amarillo Slim
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Skype drops Windows Phone 7 support
VOIP AND CHAT OUTFIT Skype is sending out confusing signals regarding its support, or maybe lack of support, for Windows Phone 7.
Earlier today Dan Neary, Asia Pacific VP and general manager of Skype, said that the firm decided not to support Microsoft's upcoming Windows Phone 7 Series operating system. Neary justified Skype's decision by saying that the operating system had a "lack of user optimisation and partner support."
However Skype seemingly wanted to distance itself from Neary's statement by telling The INQUIRER that the firm's official stance is not to "discuss future platform developments" and that any other statement being reported was "unofficial". Given that Neary sits pretty high on the Skype pile, it's astonishing that the firm is calling comments by a vice president, er, unofficial.
The firm told the INQUIRER that its official position is that it "rigorously explores opportunities presented by new mobile platforms" and that Windows Phone 7 was included in that.
Skype recently announced that it will be dropping support for previous versions of the Windows Mobile OS. Therefore, wasting engineers' time on developing for an operating system that is looking like it'll be dead in the water doesn't seem a prudent move.
When Skype makes its mind up, we'll be the first to let you know. But in the meantime, all this isn't making Microsoft's upcoming Windows Phone 7 OS look any more enticing, especially when compared to its rivals.
Developers are flocking to both Apple's Iphone OS and Google's Android operating system, whereas it seems that others won't touch the Vole's Windows Phone 7 with a bargepole. µ
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I don't know where the above poster gets her information from but it'd nice to cite your sources. Windows Phone 7 cannot be "assembled", it is software not hardware. It is the phone manufacturers who are in charge of assembling the devices, not the software companies.
I would have thought a former employee of Microsoft would know the difference?
It seems that a lot of the naysayers will be eating their own hats, Windows Phone 7 has been getting great reviews and looks to becoming well adopted. I just bought my Samsung Omnia 7 and I'm loving it! Can't wait for Skype on my phone.
WP7 will be the biggest failure yet. I am a former employe representing a union of current and former Microsoft employees.
Microsoft continues to hire Prison labor in Texas and Washington states to packages and assemble the Windows Phone 7 device. What is worse is they only pay the Prison inmates less than $.10 cents per hour for Microsoft labor. Microsoft for an entire decade has continued to hire Prison inmates to produce their products. The entire development project occurred in China and India with sweat shop labor at less than $.90 cents per hour!
The windows phone 7 device was manufactured by prison labor and sweatshop workers making the phone worth nothing.
We are writing due to the media blackout over our concerns. We have protested around Seattle, Redmond, San Jose and Kirkland areas.
Microsoft should never get away with such ABUSE and disregard for human life.
Their continued involvement and lobbying for more prison labor ensures large profit at the hands of inmates and sweatshops.
And don’t dribble.
@Adam
Exactly as i mentioned, MS prior 2005 was just right on the money in most things they've done.
They had powerful SIP APIs built into WinMo5 back then when smartphones hardware was a fracture of what current smartphones hardware could do.
They didn't capitalize on their APIs like Nokia did with their current E series due to fear of telco providers not carrying WinMo5 phones.
They could've easily built a SIP support right into their WinMo5 dialer, and allowed telcos to disable it as they see fit, rather than leaving it to 3rd party devs.
It's really a lost opportunity.
Not being able to see what MS (with their advanced technical dev skills) could have done with current smartphone hardware in regards to SIP APIs & clients is really a lost opportunity for everyone.
I've used WinMo for about 4 years or so now. I just switched up to an HTC Hero about two weeks ago and I'm here to agree, Android is the platform to win this round. I'm only using 1.5 version, but i've seen the 2.1 on the motorola Droid (without HTC Sense). Also, i'll be using Sprint's 30 days return policy on June 2 and then on June 4 going to pick up my HTC Evo 4G with a 1 Ghz snapdragon... My only two complaints really with the Hero is, battery life can be lacking, but i've seen few do much better, and it lacks the speed I had hoped for... hopefully, swapping out the 500 mhz CPU for the 1 Ghz Snapdragon will smooth things out. But, basically, as soon as someone makes a phone with the Evo's specs and enough battery life (and maybe the Evo is gonna handle all that in two weeks, we'll see) it's game over for the competition because the Android market is already ridiculously exploding with awesome apps, plenty of which are free or worth the money. Most of the laggy apps I'm referring to are the NES emulator and the XVID/MP4 player i tried. Of course, emulating a console isn't necessarily a cakewalk and decompressing a 720p file on the fly and displaying it on a 3.7" screen probably requires some CPU cycles, so we'll see how the Evo handles some of this stuff...
But, back to the article, R.I.P. WinMo... I gave MS a chance to give me what I wanted in a phone and they yet again proved how stupid they are. All that cash, and all the experience, and they still haven't learned how to deliver.
By the way, I don't think Google is worried about telecom companies getting upset with them. Google is a behemoth and don't mind giving sh!t away for free. User's like Google and hate telecom companies who have been ripping them off for decades...
Skype now says they are indeed developing for WP7 so I guess you jumped the gun
Good. Nobody wants crap phone software from a crap company. Android is the future. Windows can burn in hell.
I think this is a really strong message to MS that developers will not tolerate another Itunes incident. I am sure everyone thinks that MS has the potential for a better app store and developer community.
Nitpicking apps is not the way of the future.
Windows Mobile did have a nice VOIP SIP client built into the dialer beginning with Windows Mobile 5.0. It was not easy to configure however and required a custom operator CAB. Still, when it was working it was very cool. Vonage disabled their SIP VOIP support after that though.
Support for Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 is collapsing, even before it is released.
Microsoft's phone platform is not technically capable of running Skype. It's APIs are dysfunctional, particularly the networking APIs, which alone would prevent Skype. Then there are speed issues caused by managed code / Silverlight.
Developers would be foolish to put any resources into Windows Phone 7, as the platform will not last. It will get axed in the first half of 2011.
Microsoft has the best there is when it comes to developers and software architects.
However, as business decision maker, they seemed to have lost their way since 2005.
Prior 2005, i wouldn't be surprised if MS developed a powerful built-in SIP client that renders skype's overpriced VoIP solutions irrelevant.
But the way it is today, i don't think they understand how important VoIP to the future of mobile phones.