[Windows Phone 7 General] Spike15:
It really depends on what you mean by "spiritual". I get the feeling you're trying to debase consumer principles by using scare quotes and barely-apropos nouns however.

The problem with the modern corporate climate -- despite what people want to believe and what people say -- isn't the companies. Companies -- by definition -- are monolithic groupings that exist solely to produce profit. This instinct -- to produce profit -- is held in check by government regulation and consumers.

The government regulates through the law, and the consumer speaks through how he spends his money.

The problem with corporations nowadays isn't corporations, as some people seem to believe. The problem is that the government and consumers aren't doing their jobs. The government (at least in the United States) refuses to regulate corporations to the extent that is necessary (if you're going to be an idiot and try and argue this, why don't you just look at 2008 for a bit), and consumers have lost the ability to spend their money in a way that's in line with their beliefs.

People "talk the talk" but they don't "walk the walk". That is, they talk crap about a company, and how "evil" the company is, and yet patronize it nonetheless. The company exists solely to produce profit, so as long as you're patronizing them, they don't care what you say about them, because their ends are fulfilled.

This is what it comes down to -- for me -- with Apple, and now, Microsoft. Before I had genuine respect for Microsoft and their profits. They didn't try and over-step their bounds. They created products, and once those products were created and purchased, you could essentially do whatever you wanted with them.

Now they're becoming Apple-esque -- trying to tell people what they want, trying to tell people what they can and cannot do -- and I for one am not willing to encourage these companies with my money. As soon as they start down that slippery slope I -- being a good consumer who understands how to speak with his money -- stop patronizing them.

I guess you really enjoy talking out of your ass.

People use these functions. They really do. I'm sorry that you're such a brain-dead moron that you can't figure out how to get more out of your phone than the blatantly obvious, I really am, but just because you're a vegetable doesn't mean we all are.

I guess you don't understand the idea of "background processing". Sure, saving state sounds like multi-tasking, but it really isn't.

Imagine this: Your friend freezes totally and is unable to move anytime you're not with him. You drop him off to go for a run, and are going to go to the shops and then pick him up when you're done. With the restriction that he freezes totally when you're not with him, when you return he'll be in basically the same place where you left him. He doesn't have to restart his run, sure, but he hasn't actually accomplished his goal in the time you were away, so you have to stay with him while he runs, which you don't want to do, because if you did, you'd be running.

This is what happens with saving state. Last weekend I took a trip to Vancouver with a few buddies, and had the GPS tracking and directing us. My buddy who was riding shotgun was playing with my phone -- web browsing, putting music on the car stereo, responding to SMSes and e-mails for me, the works -- but the GPS app kept going in the background, tracking our position.

In a non-multi-tasking environment -- even with saving state -- this wouldn't've worked. As soon as he tried to go to WMP, or Outlook Mobile, or Opera Mobile, the GPS app would've had its state saved, and would've stopped, so when we wanted to just check our position to get the next direction or see how far we had to go, we couldn't just switch back to the GPS app briefly, we would have to wait for our GPS position to be reacquired.

That's bull****.

Also, might I remind you that this is 2010? We've had multi-tasking operating systems since before 1970 (the year UNIX came out). That's 40 years genius. Anyone who says that they ("they" being Microsoft, Apple, or whoever else) can't put multi-tasking in a phone operating system is a moron...

...so it's fitting that you're defending this position.

It's about options you fascist.

I shouldn't have to rely on the default apps -- no matter how good they are -- if I don't want to.

An operating system is a platform, not an appliance.

Pull your head out of your ass.

I like how you go on this quasi-rant with things like "[...] NOT SEEN A SINGLE good [...]" and "Even [...] lame and crappy and outdated" and "unable to find any customization that will make my phone look better than [...] original titanium [...]", and then you go and ruin it with "[...]except HTC rip-offs".

You realize that whole "except" invalidated your entire premise right? Did you even think before you wrote that? You realize that with WP7S that "except" will be

impossible

, right?

You are so unthinkably stupid, I don't even know why I'm bothering to respond to you.

Actually Opera Mobile 10 isn't really available on the iPhone, since Apple is a bunch of fascist pigs and doesn't allow 3rd party browsers, kind of the way Microsoft is going.

I don't see how this is an argument for or against the WM platform.

The fact that you think developers for the platform are crappy, has no bearing on the platform itself.

I could write a piece of software that would ruin your Windows install if you ran it as Administrator...it'd be really easy actually.

Does that make Windows a bad platform, or does that make you a stupid asshole for running the program with Administrator rights?

As for the "apps" on the iPhone, nearly all the apps I've seen for the iPhone are totally and utterly useless. They encapsulate functionality that was already present in some form elsewhere in the operating system.

Like a Facebook app. You have a phone, with a web browser, that can simply go to Facebook, but instead you have a stupid app.

Or tip calculators. The phone has a calculator, but instead you get an app for that.

It's braindead...

...I guess I forgot who I was talking to.

As for file managers and the like, these are called "utilities", things that do useful things which aren't entertaining and expand the functionality of your device. Registry editors allow you to customize your device in a deep and advanced way that goes beyond the GUI. File managers allow you to open your device up and get truly powerful functionality out it.

Since I discovered the UNC support in the WM built-in file manager, I don't have to take the SD card out of my phone to put photos on my PC anymore, I just switch on the WiFi and copy/paste (but phones don't need that, right WP7S apologist?) the files across the WiFi to UNC shares on my PC, or on my file server.

But instead we should rely on nebulous Zune syncing, right?

Doing things on my phone isn't painful. In fact none of the things on my phone are painful.

The only recurring issues I've had with my HD2 are because of 3rd party software. One of them -- HTC messaging -- is written by a 3rd party, so I don't see how you can bring that back on the platform (except by being a stupid ass...), and the other is Opera Mobile 10 BETA -- the word "BETA" would clue any intelligent human being into the fact that there are going to be quirks.

All platforms are going to be susceptible to the idiocy of 3rd party developers. Locking them down à la Apple or WP7S isn't the solution.