Marco.org

From Justin’s more general post about shipping incomplete platforms:

When Microsoft released Windows Phone 7 last November, the reviews generally said it was a good first effort but many features were missing that smartphone users have come to expect.

Initially, Windows Phone 7 looked surprisingly capable. It might have become the next major smartphone competitor to iOS and Android.

But, as Justin notes, it was incomplete. It was a very good 1.0 by 2008’s standards, but it was released in 2010, so it needed regular updates to be competitive.

This depended on WP7’s initial quality not being just a fluke, but an indication of a truly effective Microsoft team and product channel, like the Xbox division. I thought time would tell which of those was the case.

And unfortunately, time has told us so far that WP7’s initial promise was probably just a fluke, and that for whatever reasons (it doesn’t really matter why), I doubt we’ll be seeing any more success or noteworthy innovation from the Windows Phone 7 platform.