i posted this in another thread, its more about microsoft as a whole but i think it will find a good home in this thread
heres my take (sorry for the length)
i can agree that wm(wp7 whatever) will never gain back the marketshare it once enjoyed but i think microsoft as a whole is in trouble as well. there just isnt enough innovation and synergy between all their product lines.
as much as people on this site rag on apple/macs/iphones, no one can deny that they know what theyre doing. as draconian as some of their policies are itunes really is an awesome concept. phone/mp3 player/tablet/mac all plug into the same ecosystem. with microsoft you have some much different crap that doesnt work together its ridiculous. windows live, zune, xbox (live), wm all are pretty much on thier own for the most part with no real connection to one another.
look at google EVERYTHING works together. all the google apps, android, chrome, all one big happy seamless family. m$ is trying i guess to bring everything under one roof with wp7 but i was just reading that there will be 2 markets, one for zune & apps and a whole different one for xbox live. granted people in the know (us) probably wont have an issue with it but for the avg yuppie iphone user (which is who they want) it really isnt gonna cut it.
next indicator of the fall of babylon is the kin phones. now i fully understand who these phones are marketed for but really come on m$. we were hearing about the 'project pink' phones for what like 3 yrs and this is the result?!?! are they smartphones or feature phones? seems like they have an identity crisis. but with now 'apps', no market, very little integration with their other brands, what kind of success can they really expect from these. add in the fact that you are looking at a minimum $70 or $80 plan for a phone marketed to teens that are most likely on their parents plan and you have a recipe for massive amounts of fail.
and whether any of us care to acknowledge it or not the ipad has brought tablets to the forefront and imo its no fad, their gonna be around and they will get better. then they decide to kill off one of their most anticipated projects, the courier, wtf microsoft. then a couple days ago one of their vps saying it was too early to say tablets will catch on and become a valid and unique segment of the PC market. well if you wait to see if they catch on by then its too late dummy! the ipad sold 2 million in 2 months, every day it seems theres a new tablet being talked about running android, yeah i think theyll catch on steve.
another thing to add in after seeing that. marketing. apple=amazing, google=getting there, microsoft=meh... as much as i hated those theres an app for that commercials they were highly effective, str8 forward, to the point. those winmo commericals the had with people in "excel" and "word" costumes were just plain bizzare
sorry for the doom n gloom essay but i think the redmond folk are in some trouble over the next few years and it goes way beyond just windows mobile 6.5.111993030....