++ the future of Microsoft Lumia mobile phones ++

Well stated, Szilard!

This will be a rant to vent my frustration, so if you don’t want to read it, simply move on.

The end date of mobile support came and went. Now I’m disgruntled having owned two Lumias that I’ve really enjoyed.

https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/24/18715202/microsoft-bill-gates-android-biggest-mistake-interview

Learning about the death of Lumia/MS Mobile was bad enough, but reading that article back in June really set me off. I used to have much respect for Gates, but now consider him a multi-billionaire buffoon. That’s the nicest way I can put that. The money must’ve made you delusional, Bill. How could you possibly leave Ballmer in charge of the factory after his and Sinofsky’s boner releasing W8, then attempting to correct it with W8.1 almost overnight?! Can you say “Enterprise and Public opinion research”? What a fiasco that was! Then hurry up to develop W10 with the Insider program and all the time and money spent on that.

Meanwhile all eyes are off Windows Mobile and its development, particularly mobile Store apps. Couldn’t get one for my bank, my investment firm, retail stores, my favorite franchised gas station, and so many more. No one offered them for Windows Mobile. Why? Because Ballmer wasn’t helping developers to write them. You should’ve created a corporate app development department so that enterprise customers would be able to buy tailored apps to offer to their customers. Even if you lost money on the department you would’ve been miles ahead in other profits. Simply put, you lost out on the market because of the lack of app development. Great hardware > No apps.

I could go on, but why bother.

My solution > I hate Chinese-cuddling Scroogle, Inc so they’re out. Sweat shop iCrap devices are nothing but overpriced pieces of costume jewelry. For now I bought an Android, installed MS Launcher, installed most MS apps I like (especially Office apps), and forced-stop as much of Scroogle as possible. Next step may be to root it. In my research I’m finding there are ways to sideload. I see there are many apps out in the open source field to choose from. 99% in the Scroogle PlayBore apps are useless anyway. I may also close all my MS accounts, migrate to Linux on my other PCs/Surface, and forget the whole lot of the money-hungering corporations. I’m entertaining that thought more and more these days.

Rant over. I feel better. :)  Anyone in the market for a Lumia 950XL? It'll make a great boat anchor. :D

+my opinion is that Mr. Gates is not addressing very well his "biggest" business mistake : first of all the company leaders have abandoned the Lumia ship in 2016, when the situation was not so bad 2% - 3% market share vs. around 20% for Samsung or Apple (all this with minimal marketing & distribution strategy efforts; the company has spent more for the acquisition of GitHub than for the Lumia division); secondly if you make some mistakes you try to correct them & not abandon all the project & the idea of Windows on a phone (live tiles, which btw could be even better with fluent design elements built into them) ++ the app problem is easy to solve : who needs & who can handle millions of apps (most of the users need a couple hundred or even just tens of apps & the company's mission would have been to study what apps are actually really needed)

++ so the company's support for Windows10 mobile is on life support (some Microsoft apps will be still supported in 2020 as well) & there are still enthusiastic developers who lend a helping hand to the platform : Gameloft updates many of its games & likewise Extreme Developers (e.g. they have a brand new game available on mobile for those who like history & the era of battleships ++ USS Monterey for example) //

I hear you, Szilard, but it’s all water over the dam now. They simply abandoned the project and wrote it off on taxes. €5.4 billion for the Nokia purchase plus whatever else they invested. In 2015, Microsoft took a $7.8 billion write-down on the Nokia purchase. All chump change to them. In 2017 Belfiore revealed that Microsoft had ceased the development of new Windows phones and new features for Windows 10 Mobile, citing the losses in market share and lack of app development. Belfiore is another one that just didn’t get it.

I edited my earlier post to reflect what I was attempting to get at concerning Store apps. I was speaking of commercial customer apps such as for banks, investment firms, retail stores, fast food chains, utilities, government agencies, train & bus lines, gas stations, and so on. Yes, plenty of game and productivity apps, but the other apps are what’s important to users as well.

Along the way I would email companies as to why they didn’t offer the Windows version of their app. A standard reply was on the order of “We don’t feel the need to invest in that right now” or “We have no future plans for that”. That’s why I stated they should have created a commercial Store app department, even if they gave the apps away and lost money. So they write off a billion or so. So what? They would’ve been billions ahead in due time. Other solutions as well such as a folding phone so to use as a pad. Or a pad that makes calls. How about a Surface mobile? Easily performed with or without wired or Bluetooth ear buds. But no! Let’s just abandon the whole project altogether. Let’s just sell Nokia to an Android OS loving company. What a crock!

So now I have an OS-unsupported $500 boat anchor. A hacker’s dream come true. No thanks. I’ll move on the best I can. I’ll simply abandon my Lumia and root my new phone. Now that I’m retired, I have time to fiddle with this stuff.

Cheers

"Windows 10 Mobile, version 1709 will reach end of service on January 14, 2020. Devices running Windows 10 Mobile and Windows 10 Mobile Enterprise will no longer receive monthly security and quality updates that contain protection from the latest security threats. "

Link 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4522812/windows-10-update-kb4522812

Windows 10 Mobile is getting one more update. Hackers will not target Windows Phones, way to much security and too little market share, even if there's no further security updates. Microsoft has had over 2 years of bug fixing, stability improvements, and security updates. Lumia's running 1709 are basically a fortress of security, this has ruined battery life though, especially when using Edge. Aside from that, incompatibility with other devices make W10 Mobile harder to breach, this wasn't intended as it makes Lumia less useful.

I'm not saying they can't, but what are the chances of you encountering someone trying to hack a Lumia? Because I haven't seen another person with a Lumia this entire year.

zero chance, because no one is using them.