this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2025
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Hell, even the juggernauts of Microsoft and Amazon tried, and they got crushed out of the market.
Microsoft was already an established player in the smartphone market when the iPhone came out. It was Apple who came into the market and ate the lunches of MS and Blackberry.
I kind of feel like MS tried three distinct times, first with their WinMo products pre-Apple, then with their Nokia partnership, then finally with one last push through the mid-10's before Intel finally made x86 on mobile an impossibility (nuking the Atom line, selling their 5G modem business to Apple, etc) and before there just weren't any paths forward for MS.
Amazon and FB having their own phone product lines felt like the weirdest me-too-also-ran Android reskins to extend their own walled gardens, but also felt like both threw in the towel after like 18 months?!?
MS had to be a loser for more than a decade before they gave up. They were really great at being a big loser.
It's just .. apparent that nobody is going to do this for the love of the game, and that they can only get minimum market presence by financing their way to launching yet another walled garden ecosystem. Which is exactly what we all want to avoid in this group.
Honestly I think they could if they actually invested in it hard enough but they just half ass it and are surprised when it fails
Microsoft spent billions and even bought Nokia to try and be a 3rd player. The problem wasn’t their commitment, it was a lack of developers releasing apps for their OS. Without the millions of apps available on iOS and Android, people weren’t buying the phones.
Yeah they would have to actively pay for things to get ported to their ecosystem and work with developers to do facilitate that.
An investment that big would be a huge risk they aren't willing to take. But half assing it ensures failure.
Exactly