Microsoft looks to cash in on the iPhone

Having worked for both the platform using native technologies, I can say that there is a fundamental, yet complimenting differences between the two. These two coming together is akin to bringing together the creativity AND responsibility. (I dont think I need to spell out who is creative and who is responsible :))…

Creativity and Innovation that brings about the best (and cool) in terms of user experience… and Responsibility, maturity and broader audience engagement that allows a person to continue to have an older version of the OS with the latest development tools…

I would have bought an iPhone a long time ago IF THEY SUPPORTED EXCHANGE SERVER. IMHO Exchange Server is one of the most productive and well thought out technologies ever created…I do everything in Outlook calendar, mail, tasks, etc. even on my Mac. So why can;t I tie that into iPhone and go buy two-three for me & my family? C’mon Apple and AT&T - get this done and widen your sales potential exponentially.

the iphone SHOULD be called the yphone, as in “y the hell did i buy this phone?” i hate it. the touchscreen is impossible to use and the connection is terrible. whenever i see someone with a yphone, i judge them.

I have no idea what is microsoft up to!

MoiN
http://www.anewmorning.com

Let’s be honest.. Apple makes a great products (because Steve Jobs is a total maniac) and MSFT makes apps that have to work with thousands of software and hardware providers - you may not like MSFT, but Apple doesn’t have the DNA to do what MSFT does and vice versa. MSFT could try to create apps in a closed environment, as Apple does, but it’s not the way the company is engineered, nor was it ever.

I’ve worked for Apple and now work for MSFT. I love my Apple gadgets, but in the end it’s MSFT that makes the world work (and money).

Anyway you slice it, without the hundreds of business apps that my new employer creates it would be a less productive business environment.

It’s just the way things are…

By the way - the truly evil company is Google… Not Apple, Not Oracle, Not SAP and not MSFT…

Like OMG! Look how old Tom Gibbons, head of M$’s Spectralized Devices and Applicators is!

We can’t allow old people to develop for the Mac. We’ll lose our cache of cool.

Oh man, as a past president of the West Australian Mac Users Group and Mac power-user since 1985, I am embarrassed by the unbelievably knee-jerk anti-Microsoft comments by the Mac-extremists in this forum.

Put a sock in it will you guys - you’re giving the rest of us a very bad name. Sheesh.

Sure MS have their major problems and issues, but this development can only be a good thing as MS helps to reinforce the corporate credentials of the iPhone.

Please spare us the invective - it only gives the anti-Mac crowd like gibbs more ammunition.

Oh and about the $150 million investment MS made in non-voting Apple stock - Apple actually had $4 billion in the bank at the time so it was a gesture of support not a bail-out. -hh has it right that MS’s commitment with Office was the important issue at the time.

-Mart

This is great. MicroSoft will be totally beholden to Apple for any software they create for the iPhone as it must be sold through the Apps store and Apple will get a cut of the profits! (Although i guess MS could threaten to withhold Exchange compatibility or something.)

Also, MS only bought about $150 million of non-voting Apple stock way back when. That money was quite irrelevant as Apple still had billions in the bank and Jobs was back at the helm.
What was more important, was that MS promised to keep developing Office for Mac for at least 5 more years. That gave Apple a huge credibility boost in places where they were considering dumping Apple after their 12 years of unbelievable mismanagement by Scully, Amelio, et al.

Now, thankfully, the iPhone and the Mac can do quite well with or without MS, but if they happen to create a wonderful new version of Solitaire or something, Apple will benefit as well.

dont worry, all this bickering about these 2 software giants, eventually 15-20yrs from now the international laws will change both entities will merge 2 form a monopoly so enjoy the rival symbiotic relationship of both for noww…

@Smurfman
Regardless of the reasons, Apple only exists today because of Microsoft. And for the record, I think that both companies are evil. Read this month’s issue of Wired for a great look into Apple. Just as evil as Microsoft.

@Bill:
OK, let’s remember Mac Fan-boys that the only reason that there is an Apple today is because of the cash infusion that Microsoft pumped into Apple in the late 90s. How soon we forget…

The $150M that MS got (in non-voting stock) was important to Apple, but not for what it represented as cash, for Apple had over $1B in the bank in 1997.

What the MS-Apple agreement obstensively was to settle infringements, what the real key of the agreement was was the promise by MS to continue to develop MS-Office for another 5 years, which provided confidence that the Mac platform would not be ‘orphaned’ due to a lack of Application software. Considering that Mac Office 98 shipped a mere 7 months later, its development was already underway at Microsoft, so the only reason to withhold shipping it was as a tool for leverage over Apple for a more favorable (to MS) settlement on the infringments. Afterall, given how much money MS has squandered away on various projects (IE, Zune, XBox, etc), it is clear that there’s factors other than merely profit that motivate MS to keep the Mac Business Unit operating, and given how lousy of a product Mac Office 2008 is, they shouldn’t be particularly proud, even if they are turning a profit.

-hh

I can’t stand the Apple loving hippies. I love the MAC platform, but I love the Windows platform too.

Vista is far from crap and is by far the best operating system MS has ever shipped (with less problems than the ship version on leopard, that’s right, when you have a specific platform to develop for and can’t get it right, there is a problem. MS develops for ALL platforms)

I don’t see where the outrage comes from because MS wants to develop software. The initial development of Office on MAC (lest we forget $150 mil in non voting stock) saved Apple. That deal also made money for MS though, so win-win. MS will develop for iPhone/iTouch and we’ll all be happy. Another thing, why is it anti-competitive to bundle basic applications with an OS with Windows, but OSX comes with Safari, no? Quicktime? iCal? And Apple pushes the H.264 format far more than MS does with .wmv/.wma

This fan-boy thing is so pathetic.

And don’t forget Wondoze girls that there would be no Windows if Gates didn’t work for Apple early on and steal their ideas right out from under their noses. It was Jobs fault for trusting him though and the only reason Gates gave loaned money to Apple was to ensure Microsoft didn’t become a monopoly so the government wouldn’t split the company up like AT&T.

What is an iPhone? I am from the deep south and I have never heard of such macic.

OK, let’s remember Mac Fan-boys that the only reason that there is an Apple today is because of the cash infusion that Microsoft pumped into Apple in the late 90s. How soon we forget. Without that help, Apple would have gone bankrupt and would not have even been able to intro the ipod, the product that saved the company.

@Greg and Larry
It’s 2008, not 1998. Bill Gates is retired and the iPhone is doing quite well without needing to license all it’s patents to Microsoft to survive.

@Realist
Spot on, brother. If you work in a corporate environment, this is good news. If you don’t need to use MS apps, move on.

@Asher Pat
What’s the weather like in Fantasyland?

Good. Some value will be added to mac poop that otherwise is only good as eye candy - sitting pretty on your table.
Of what value can be a machine like mac on which you cant even upgrade hdd or memory.

“Always fun to read the moronic comments of Mac haters…”

There are no “Mac haters”, this is an invention of Apple supporters (yes, like supporters of a football club, that think that a commercial entity such as Manchester United is like some tribal honour of theirs or that it has some higher virtues). Apple supporters promote this bogey of “MSFT fan-boys” in order to justify they own urge to pad the pockets of Apple shareholders. But hey it’s a free world, you can do whatever you want!

BTW, a true definition of a “fan-boy”: “a person keen to promote the success of a commercial entity for no direct tangible benefit to himself”. Think about it a bit and will make sense.

So, will anybody in their right mind try to promote MSFT? It is a boring capitlalist company, so there are NO MSFT “fan-boys”. But AAPL? A shiny example of hippie anti-capitalinst underdog chick that any poseur wants to be assoviated with.

Apple has already licensed Active Sync from Microsoft and it works WONDERFUL with the native, Easy to use, uncluttered mail and calendar package already on the iPhone. Steve Balmer was laughing at the iPhone 6 months ago and now its a big push to see if they can write software for the platform. iPhone has in 6 months already blown passed windows mobile in market share. When iPhone 2.0 comes out RIM is in trouble. That’s not an accident. I smell fear. What this world does NOT need is More Microsoft.

This does not suprise me at all. Microsoft has always been a poor follower and a lousy innovator.

Companies scope competitor’s products all the time.

Those who say RIP MSFT because they are checking out the iPhone SDK has no understanding of business/comp/product analysis. It would be stupid to not assess free dev kit from a competition (a la AAPL doing the same for MSFT SDKs.)

It would be like saying RIP AAPL for making Safari available for Windows. Huh, they must be in the throes of desparation if they have to make it available on their archrival’s OS. That would make no sense like most of the Apple fan boys’ said comments.

Apple desperately needs Microsoft’s applications for the iPhone in order to save that platform. Microsoft, in return (and to continue to allow Exchange connectivity on the iPhone), will demand and obtain a license to all the patents Apple has on the iPhone. Then Microsoft will incorporate amazing new innovations into Windows Mobile platform and a couple of years later all of its products will seize to function properly on the iPhone.

Sometimes, it is sad how people fight over something so small. Seems like some people should get out more.

One word….”Vista”

I can’t believe that anyone at Microsoft is really looking to mess with the iphone. They should really fix PPC 5 or 6 and get it together in that platform, before trying to ruin another, with more issues than they can handle.

It goes to show you that Bill Gates is no longer the wiz kid he was 30 years ago, when he feels threatened by someone’s success. Hey Bill all that money and technology won’t help you live for ever so that you can control the industry. In the next 10 years Microsoft will start to lose it’s grip and it will be just another software company. After dealing with them and their technology for the last 20 years the writing is just stating to show up on the walls. RIP Microsoft.

Microsoft developing for the iPhone would help Apple’s credibility with enterprise IT and Microsoft would benefit from an open platform alternative to RIM.

“In fact, the software giant is probing the gadget for profit opportunities.”

Don’t you mean “imitation opportunities?”

Expect a ZunePhone in the near future. And expect it to be amazingly similar to the iPhone.

Always fun to read the moronic comments of Mac haters…

I don’t mind seeing Microsoft produce stuff for the iPhone. One good thing about the Mac is that there’s frankly more competition for ‘office-like’ products, with many people using iWork and others using NeoOffice. The recent MS Office for Mac release is uninspiring, and the loss of VB scripting will have a negative impact on cross platform document portability.

I routinely get documents that crash MS Office on the Mac that I open in either iWork or NeoOffice (using the -older- formats, not the new OOXML stuff…

The iPhone produces a new -level- playing field for these products, may the best product win!

Always fun to read the whiny comments of MAC lovers…

I won’t be surprised that most of these negative comments came from a Window PC. If it weren’t for Microsoft, we would still be licking our stamps to mail in our comments.

You are all in a “Mac Daze”…You are so caught up in the Mac vs. Microsoft saga that you fail to see that this is a great opprotunity for both companies…and in the end, only good can come from this because you don’t have to use any of the applications if you don’t want too…It is just added options.

Leave it to Microsoft to trying and bring a gargantuan suite like Office to the iPhone and completely killing the UI & performance.

Here comes Microsoft to ruin yet another piece of hardware. It’s a good thing iPhone apps will be optional. If I don’t want Microsoft’s crap on my iPhone, I don’t have to put it on there.

Let the FUD campaign begin. Scare away smaller developers by pre-announcing nothing but intent to develop something.

Microsoft “goodies”..? -What’s that??? There’s an oxymoron if I ever heard one. They can’t even get their own software right.

Just like Microsoft- take other people’s hard work and use it to save yourself from self destruction. Microsoft is one of the WORST companis who makes an outright POS operating system that we are all stuck with at work because companies are morons.