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You know that this is taste, right? I got so fed up with Android's horrible UX and lack of consistency that I ditched it for windows phone, and I'm not looking back.

It's a really excellent smartphone OS. Fast, usable with one hand, clean, no clutter, instant overview. The only disadvantage is a smaller app ecosystem - this matters to many people but not to all by far.

I used Windows Phone for several years and loved it. The app ecosystem is smaller, but the built-in features are so nice that you don't need a whole lot of apps (does the iPhone or Android have a QR reader built in yet, or built-in social networking apps?) With the amount of work and money that Microsoft puts into making sure any dev can make a Windows Phone version of their app as easily as possible, the only reason devs don't support it (especially if they have a Windows 8 app, looking at you Google) is pure apathy.

> the only reason devs don't support it ... is pure apathy.

Plus $99 per year for the privilege of loading your proto-app onto your own phone.

Versus just picking-up an Android phone and starting to hack, I can understand the lack of interest.

There's also the problem of the intersection of mobile-oriented developers and developers familar with the MS development stack; I'd say that the majority of the latter are back-end corporate coders, not front-end app developers.

It's been $19/yr for over a year now vs. the $25 one time cost to get into the Play Store. Also free for students and MSDN members.

I believe the fee is there to prevent a malware propagation problem like we have on Android.

>It's been $19/yr for over a year now vs. the $25 one time cost to get into the Play Store. Also free for students and MSDN members.

In fact, Microsoft recently removed the annual fee altogether. The developer subscription is now a one-time charge of $19 [0], which lets you publish apps to both the Windows and Windows Phone stores.

[0]: http://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2014/09/17/new-dev-cen...

I won't touch any OS made by a company that thinks installing a program that I wrote, on a computer that I bought, is a chargeable service. I suspect many hackers feel the same. It's the principle.

> I believe the fee is there to prevent a malware propagation problem like we have on Android.

Anecdotally, I have had zero problems with malware on Android and I have used Android since 2010, and I have never known anyone to have a problem. Yet you're making it out to be some kind of huge deal, also $19 a year is still more than $0 a year to build your own app for your own hardware. Not being able to side-install apps on other platforms is the sole reason for me using Android, because otherwise I would use iOS which otherwise has the best phones and eco-system period.

Anecdotally, I haven't seen an issue around me with malware on Windows either from 2010 (except one person complaining about the Ask toolbar bundled with Java/Flash).

I guess you haven't been looking at the news about Android Malware.

https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...

I am extremely skeptical that $19/year is significant compared to the value of the resources used to build an app (any app). I realize people can be in situations where getting $19 together at one time can be hard and still be able to develop apps, but that seems like a very corner case.

Does the $19 (not $99) fee to get an app running on a phone really hurt that much? Maybe for hackers who likely won't be publishing to the store or looking to make a profit, but for people making money off other stores, it's negligible. You'll make that back in publicity alone, since you'll make news just by being on the store. The developer fee for iOS doesn't put a damper on the number of people who develop there.

I'm not sure what you mean by lack of familiarity with the MS development stack. Javascript is pretty ubiquitous. C++ isn't uncommon either. And as I mentioned, Microsoft puts a lot of effort into helping devs get their apps running on Windows Phone.

It would help your argument a lot if you didn't spread misinformation.

>hackers who likely won't be publishing to the store or looking to make a profit

These people matter to the ecosystem. A lot. Today's tinkerer, tomorrow's app developer.

>The developer fee for iOS doesn't put a damper on the number of people who develop there.

Oh really? Not a lot of Free Software on iOS (or 'free' with a little 'f' for that matter).

I am not saying one is better over the other, I am saying, the general public do not want a phone running Windows Phone OS nor want to learn it. The tech crowd that frequent this site are a whole different subset of people, we are not the general public, we make informed decisions mostly on our technology purchases based on more reasons other than, "it has the apps I need". Most people buy phones running operating systems that have the same apps and games that their friends do.

The issue with Microsoft's strategy is that Windows Phone OS has a market share of around 3%, compared to that of Android which is sitting somewhere close to 80%. Does it not make sense to release a Microsoft Lumia phone running Android and Windows Phone OS? Let us be honest here, Microsoft Windows phones do not come anywhere near the amount of applications and games that Android and iOS have and when you are selling to the uninformed buyer which is comprised of teenagers with a fear of missing out and people that fall somewhere in the middle, being on the same level as your competitors is essential.

That makes as much sense as Google making Chromebooks run Windows to sell more of them. There is not much money to be made in the Android OEM market unless you're Samsung(and even their profit is falling precipitously). I think the world has enough Android OEMs and that Microsoft has enough cash to burn.

Your point is moot. The whole point of Microsoft running Android is because of the ecosystem and ability to appease to the greater market who already use and are familiar with Android, love its selection of applications and games. It is all about the market share and awareness.

A Chromebook running Windows would be pointless because the point of a Chromebook is to not compete with Microsoft or even the laptop market, Chromebooks are going for a subset of the market that a lot of manufacturers and companies like Microsoft are not interested in targeting: the low income earner, the student, the user who only surfs the internet and watches Youtube videos.

You are comparing a laptop running a desktop operating system with a phone running a mobile operating system. Two completely different things and markets.

How does Windows Phone pale in comparison with Android? I use both daily. In my experience there's pretty good feature parity. Windows Phone wins for me because it works as before without a Microsoft account, the tiles are just... easier, and its easier to find things, and (hardware) apart from the camera, the battery lasts for longer than a day.

Not only do I agree with the other replies, it should also be noted that Verizon has gone out of their way to badmouth, undersell and not update the Nokia line. It is well known that the Verizon sales people push Android and even the iPhone over the Lumia in the USA . The love for the Nokia/MS phone is still really strong despite all these roadblocks.

" They have some of the best phones on the market, but they go relatively unnoticed because they're running an operating system most people are not interested in using or dislike"

Actually this is incorrect. Many love the Windows 8.1 phone and would not use another mobile os. They have a really loyal group of fans which is really unusual for a Microsoft product.

Microsoft entered the mobile game too late. The OS is great. It's just hard playing catch-up when you are not the cool kid.

> It is so painfully obvious and as usual, Microsoft just do not get it

Oh, they get it. They just don't want to admit a multi-billion dollar mistake, and maybe they are still hoping that project will succeed. Plus there's like one person in the company capable of making such a huge decision.

I'd argue the project has already succeeded. Of course this requires understanding success - how much profit does 3% of the US market, and just under 10% internationally amount to? Is more sales than Blackberry success? How about a comparison with Sailfish? It's all relative.

Microsoft's problems are more subtle. Writing universal apps makes little sense, as neat as the tech is, because you can only ever target many PCs and tablets, and a tiny share of phones -- or you could write an HTML/CSS/JS app, target all PCs and all phones. Their stack is solid, and their tooling arguably best in class. Selling it is not so easy.

If you're arguing that Blackberry and Jolla are major players, then Microsoft are killing it. Since the sales of Blackberry and Jolla are rounding errors, though, I'd say that they aren't a good benchmark.

Nokia really missed the boat on adopting Android back in 2010 when Samsung did. Nokia was still bigger than Samsung then in smartphone sales. After that, Android really took off (like from 4 to 30 percent market share in one year), and Nokia started to rapidly decline.

The choice of going WP7 later on, only compounded on the initial decision of not going Android, as WP was behind in features, recognition, and of course, apps. Three years later, WP still has 2 percent market share globally. It's going nowhere fast, to say the least, even with Microsoft's billions that it has invested in it so far.

Isn't that the Nokia X line of phones?

http://www.microsoft.com/en/mobile/phones/nokia-x/

Nokia X phones do not possess the same great specs and hardware as the Lumia line of phones. I was referring to the lack of Lumia phone running Android. If the Lumia 930 ran Android, I would buy it in a heartbeat. I know a lot of people would.