Microsoft can admit to failure: They gave up on Zune.
Microsoft cannot give
up on phones, and they think of
tablets as their bridge into the phone
market.
People are not buying desktops. The are not buying
anything like
as many laptops as they used to. They
are buying phones. Lots and lots of
phones and
occasionally a tablet, e-reader or set top box.
People are
using their phones for tasks that used
to belong on a desktop or laptop. The
next generation
of phones will be faster than an old but useful
desktop /
laptop. If you attach a keyboard and
monitor to a modern smart phone, it is
capable of
doing the vast majority of what people use home
computers
for.
Intel have seen this coming for years, which
explains their
determination to make a low power
x86 CPU. They have got power consumption
close to
reasonable at the cost of needing lots of help
from the operating
system. They are not showing
enough progress on costs. Intel have missed the
boat because Apple and Samsung are building their
own CPU's. Intel are wading
out into the sea
anyway because the desktop / laptop island is
sinking.
Microsoft have caught on that they cannot get off
the laptop /
desktop island with Intel. They have
missed the mobile phone boat, but have to
leap into
the sea anyway. They need third party software
recompiled for ARM,
and able to work with a touch
interface. Insisting on a touch interface for
keyboard oriented tasks is insane, but so is
insisting on being the exclusive
app-store for RT.
Add in the tiny installed base and the lousy reviews,
and
you can see why third party software vendors
are not making an effort to
support RT.
$100/app is not going to stock the shelves with
RT software.
Neither is $1000/app, but I am sure
Microsoft will go their because they
have nowhere
else to go.
While Microsoft is dithering about $10,000
per app,
we will get Tizen, Sailfish, Firefox and Ubuntu phones.
Also, a neat
clamshell case with an LCD, keyboard and a
slot where the track pad used to be
for a mobile
phone.
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