Carriers and bankers not liking Nokia’s chances against iPhone/Android. Is it over? (Poll)

Seth Weintraub

Although Nokia may or may not be having some success in the United States with its heavy Lumia 900 marketing campaign under AT&T, it does not appear to have made any headway on its home turf in Europe. AT&T will give you $50 to take one of its Lumia 900 phones in the United States, but it has already fallen off the Best Selling list at Amazon.

Yesterday, the credit rating agency Moody’s downgraded Nokia’s debt to near junk level citing a “sharp decline in first-quarter cell phone sales that led to a 35 percent fall in revenue.” Standard & Poor’s announced a similar downgrade in March. Nokia’s share prices plunged another 20 percent in recent days on news that it would not come close to its forecasts.

Things do not seem to be looking up, either. Reuters talked to four European carriers that said Nokia phones simply could not compete with Apple’s iPhone and the Android devices already available.

“No one comes into the store and asks for a Windows phone,” said an executive in charge of mobile devices at a European operator, which has sold the Lumia 800 and 710 since December

When the Nokia 900 launched, we asked: “What question does the Lumia 900 answer? Why would you buy a Lumia over an iPhone or Android device?” Read more

Siri alternatives and knockoffs also land in Windows Phone Marketplace

Jordan Kahn

We showed you some Siri clones available in the Android Market last week that use official Apple icons, and they are even promoted as “Real Siri for Android” and “Siri for Android.” Now, the first round of Windows Phone Siri alternatives seem to be popping up in the WP Marketplace.

If you are craving Siri like functionality for Windows Phone and more, look no further. Ask Ziggy is your Personal Assistant that goes beyond Siri functionality.

The first app is called “Ask Ziggy” from developer Shai Leib and it is not exactly a rip-off like the Android Siri alternatives. As you can see in the video above from WP Central, the app takes inspiration from the Siri UI and seems to work rather smoothly in comparison to Windows Phone’s built-in TellMe voice control features. It does not borrow Apple’s icons, but has an overall similar feel to Siri. The app apparently utilizes Nuance voice-recognition (same as Siri), but the developers handled everything else themselves. It is available for free now, and the updated version seen in the video should be landing soon.

Another Siri alternative for Windows Phone currently available in the Marketplace isn’t really a functioning voice control app, but it is marketed as “Siri for Windows Phone”. The name “iSiri Faker” also seems to be associated with the app. This app will allow you to “fake Siri conversations on your Windows Phone.” We are not sure exactly what that means, but according to the app’s description you can “program custom responses” using speech recognition, text to speech, data compression, and voice effects. The app is available for $0.99 in the Marketplace. Screenshots are available after the break.
Read more

iPhones beat out Nokia Lumia 800 Windows Phone in browser benchmark, despite earlier reports

Jordan Kahn

359gsm (via My Nokia Blog) recently pitted the iOS 4.3-based iPhone 4 and the iOS 5-based iPhone 4S against a Windows Phone 7.5 Mango-based Nokia Lumia 800 smartphone in various benchmark tests. In every test, both the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S significantly outperform one of the best Windows Phone options on the market. This is in contrast to reports in April, prior to Mango’s release, that claimed Window Phone’s IE 9 on Mango devices beat mobile Safari in similar browser benchmark tests.

You can view the results in the video above or get the full results below (via 359gsm). As you can see, the iPhone 4S significantly passes the Lumia 800 in all tests, including: Browsermark tests, Speed Reading test, Sunspider, Acid3, and HTML5. The iPhone 4 also outperforms the Lumia in most tests, although by a narrower margin.

Read more

Little bug in Windows Phone 7: An SMS message can crash the phone and break the messaging hub, more

Seth Weintraub

According to Winrumors, you can take out a Windows Phone 7 device (they say various Windows Phone 7s on any carrier) with a single, solitary SMS message with a [redacted at request of Winrumors].  Worse (or better?) yet, it doesn’t have to be a text, it can be a Facebook message or Windows Live chat.

The flaw works simply by sending an SMS to a Windows Phone user. If the SMS contains a particular string of text then Windows Phone 7.5 devices will reboot and the messaging hub will not open despite repeat attempts. We have tested the attack on a range of Windows Phone devices, including HTC’s TITAN and Samsung’s Focus Flash. The attack is not device specific and appears to be an issue with the way the Windows Phone messaging hub handles particular characters. The bug is also triggered if a user sends a Facebook chat message or Windows Live Messenger message to a recipient.

And you don’t just get a reboot.  When your phone comes hobbling back to life, the Messaging hub no longer works.  And other parts of the OS are wonky.

If a user has pinned a friend as a live tile on their device and the friend posts a particular string of text on Facebook then the live tile will update and causes the device to lock up.

The fix? Hard reset of the device.  Ouch.

In a totally unrelated note, the head of the Windows Phone 7 division was fired today.  Read more

Microsoft exec: Siri is nothing special, we’ve had it for over a year

9to5 Staff

Microsoft and Apple tackled touch interfaces in diametrically opposing ways. As Apple set out to bring multitouch on mobile devices to the masses with the 2007 release of the original iPhone, Microsoft created a blown up version with its Surface multitouch tabletop (which can now be yours for a cool $8,400, shipping in early 2012).

Microsoft also progressed natural user interfaces with the Kinect motion controller for the Xbox 360 console while Apple charted its way into the future with an artificial intelligence-driven personal assistant dubbed Siri.

So, when Microsoft’s chief strategy and research officer Craig Mundie sat down with Forbes’ Eric Savitz to talk the company’s planned expansion of the new user interface, he did what Microsoft executives typically do when challenged with a cool tech developed outside the Windows maker’s labs: He stuck his foot in his mouth over Apple’s groundbreaking digital secretary exclusive to the iPhone 4S.

In the above clip, he said (mark 1:45):

People are infatuated with Apple announcing it. It’s good marketing, but at least as the technological capability you could argue that Microsoft has had a similar capability in Windows Phones for more than a year, since Windows Phone 7 was introduced.

Windows Phones, seriously? Mundie couldn’t acknowledge Siri as an ace up Apple’s sleeve and barely accepted that Microsoft could learn a lesson or two about “productizing” technology. He then went on to describe how their version of Siri works on Windows Phones:
Read more