Windows Phone $100 Challenge

[Mopetar]

An article over at The Verge had an interesting story about something Microsoft was doing at CES. They asked random people at the show to use their phone to compete against a Windows Phone phone to see which person could do the task faster. If the challenger won, they got $100.

Apparently they were 30-3-1. They probably picked only things that they were pretty sure that they'd win, but it's still a pretty good bit of marketing and highlights some of the best WP7 features. They have a lot of the videos uploaded to their YouTube channel if you're curious.

 

[pantsaregood]

The videos are actually pretty entertaining. Some of the people that lose just look dumbfounded.

The guy actually does a pretty decent amount of different tests. They do manage to cover most of the bases of what the average user would do.

 

[Kelvrick]

Did they cover playing games?

 

[Mopetar]

Of the ones I could find where he lost, both were about uploading pictures to Twitter and it seemed as though it really only lost because it uploaded slower, so I'm kind of curious about what carriers the different devices were using.

Here's one where it loses to a Galaxy Nexus, and here's one where it loses to an iPhone 4S. Haven't watched all of the videos so I don't know what else they lost to or if that video is even uploaded.

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

so I'm kind of curious about what carriers the different devices were using.

I think they linked to the same wifi hotspot so there would be no difference in carrier.

 

[Belegost]

As a WinPhone user I'm not really surprised by this. When I first picked up the HD7 and tried to do things, it was very streamlined compared to android at the time (November 2010) that and the zune integration sold me on the platform.

Truth is, even now when I'm with friends/coworkers that have LTE android phones and something occurs that we want to, check a map, look up movie times, or take a picture my "outdated" phone will often get to results faster. When my contract comes up next year, I will definitely be looking at a newer WinPhone.

 

[T_Yamamoto]

interesting.

 

[Puddle Jumper]

So basically the average person isn't incredibly quick when it comes to using their phone for an arbitrary task.

When it comes to doing stuff I actually care about my Galaxy S2 will leave any WP7 in the dust. I can see my latest texts, calendar, a five day weather forecast, the traffic status of my commute, and directly access my most frequent contacts without leaving the home screen.

How fast can WP7 attach 3 different types of files to a single email and send it?

 

[pantsaregood]

Of the ones I could find where he lost, both were about uploading pictures to Twitter and it seemed as though it really only lost because it uploaded slower, so I'm kind of curious about what carriers the different devices were using.

Here's one where it loses to a Galaxy Nexus, and here's one where it loses to an iPhone 4S. Haven't watched all of the videos so I don't know what else they lost to or if that video is even uploaded.

I didn't watch the 4S video, and I hate to make excuses, but...

The Titan, by default, takes pictures at 8MP. The Galaxy Nexus at 5MP. A 5MP image is going to upload in a shorter time than an 8MP image.

 

[Aikouka]

I'm surprised that a few of those people lost. Like the guy using what I assume was Shazaam. It took him longer to "listen" to the song than it does for me to open Shazaam, listen and match the song. The person posting to Facebook should have opened Facebook and taken the picture.

EDIT:

Oh and the iPhone guy in the weather challenge could have just swiped down, hit the weather thing at the top and been in the weather app.

 

[XJustMeX21]

Love my Galaxy Nexus but if Verizon was to get the Lumia 900 with LTE I'd switch very quickly.

 

[Anubis]

I'm surprised that a few of those people lost. Like the guy using what I assume was Shazaam. It took him longer to "listen" to the song than it does for me to open Shazaam, listen and match the song. The person posting to Facebook should have opened Facebook and taken the picture.

EDIT:

Oh and the iPhone guy in the weather challenge could have just swiped down, hit the weather thing at the top and been in the weather app.

hes using soundhound but yea that seemed to take forever i get it in about a 1/4 pie chart

 

[MrX8503]

I didn't watch the 4S video, and I hate to make excuses, but...

The Titan, by default, takes pictures at 8MP. The Galaxy Nexus at 5MP. A 5MP image is going to upload in a shorter time than an 8MP image.

Thats a good point. The 4S wouldn't have won if Apple didn't integrate twitter.

The thing about WP7 is that it doesn't rely on apps to do a lot of common tasks, its all built in, which is something that I really like about the phone.

I've always wanted universal sync of my contacts, WebOS called it synergy, WP7 doesn't have a name for it (I think), but what it does is that you have 1 contact, and it aggregates everything, their facebook, twitter, etc.

 

[crisscross]

Good to see Microsoft getting their marketing right on Windows Phone.

 

[GTaudiophile]

MS should air a few during the Super Bowl and ATTEMPT for once to gain some mindshare for WinPhone7.

 

[smartpatrol]

There's supposedly going to be a huge $200 million marketing campaign for the Lumia 900. Hopefully that will finally get people excited for Windows Phone.

 

[trmiv]

I've always wanted universal sync of my contacts, WebOS called it synergy, WP7 doesn't have a name for it (I think), but what it does is that you have 1 contact, and it aggregates everything, their facebook, twitter, etc.

See and I want all that stuff completely separate. Different strokes!

 

[JeffreyLebowski]

There's supposedly going to be a huge $200 million marketing campaign for the Lumia 900. Hopefully that will finally get people excited for Windows Phone.

Sorry, but you can generate hype, but when people go to use the phone, they will be sorely disappointed. The UI sucks. Just looking at them side by side with an Android phone or iPhone, I hate the WP7 UI. Big stupid squares force you to scroll for basic tasks. With Android or iOS you can put your common tasks on the home screen and be done. 1 click and your app is running.

 

[dougp]

Sorry, but you can generate hype, but when people go to use the phone, they will be sorely disappointed. The UI sucks. Just looking at them side by side with an Android phone or iPhone, I hate the WP7 UI. Big stupid squares force you to scroll for basic tasks. With Android or iOS you can put your common tasks on the home screen and be done. 1 click and your app is running.

And funny enough, you can do that with WP7 by pinning an app to the home screen! While some might point out Android has widgets, well, WP7 has live tiles. iOS lacks any comparative feature to either option, and all of them can launch apps in one click. Very few people I know don't like the WP7 Metro interface - hell, it's been so well received that we've seen the Xbox styled after it, along with the new Windows 8 interface.

 

[podspi]

WP7's UI is very different, so I agree that it is a love-it or hate-it kind of thing. It is going to be interesting to see what happens when Microsoft brings the Metro UI to the desktop. A lot of people are going to be pissed off...

 

[dougp]

WP7's UI is very different, so I agree that it is a love-it or hate-it kind of thing. It is going to be interesting to see what happens when Microsoft brings the Metro UI to the desktop. A lot of people are going to be pissed off...

I'm not a fan of the iOS interface, but I use it on two devices because I prefer the app-mosphere of iOS over WP7 or Android. People will adjust - they didn't like Aero in Vista, but they adapted to it in Win7, so who knows what will happen with Metro being integrated into Win8.

 

[bucwylde23]

I like the guy who was using the Palm Pre Plus. He didn't even have a chance. WAs nice of them to give him a phone.

 

[kaerflog]

I don't see how Microsoft just doesn't get it.
To appeal to the regular consumer, you need to have an aesthetically good looking UI.
People don't want plain colored tiles.
People want to have wallpapers on their home screen. Little stuff like that.
How many of us constantly messed with our home screen to make it more attractive ??
MS needs to make the tiles transparent so you can put wallpaper in the background.
Or make the tiles as a wallpaper like the picture below.
Make the UI more attractive and people will pay more attention.

 

[kaerflog]

This is a much better looking home screen.

 

[dougp]

This is a much better looking home screen.

Outside of the wallpaper, that is Metro. Why does a wallpaper matter when it is being filled by the large tiles? The concept of Metro is minimalism and reduced clutter. You can modify it on your phone if you're dev unlocked, but even most people I know that use an iPhone don't change the background except on the lockscreen.