Is 8 and 8.1 creating OS illiterate smartphone users?

[adamf]

The good ole days, were when we did not have to deal with the garbage coming out of the likes of Microsoft.

You got it exactly - The sun shone all day in the summer, it snowed every Christmas eve, the rich were generous and the poor were noble. Then Bill Gates invented windows and suddenly we have global warming, missing planes and even poor old Gwyneth Paltrow has to separate. Yikes.

 

[popeye]

The good ole days, were when we did not have to deal with the garbage coming out of the likes of Microsoft.

You got it exactly - The sun shone all day in the summer, it snowed every Christmas eve, the rich were generous and the poor were noble. Then Bill Gates invented windows and suddenly we have global warming, missing planes and even poor old Gwyneth Paltrow has to separate. Yikes.

Conscious Uncoupling

 

[broe23]

HG, quick question: How do you make those screenshots on your W8P. With mine it says to push the Home and Power-on buttons at the same time. That always only gets me a screenshot of the home screen. What am I missing - maybe my 521 is a bit retarded ??

I found it odd that when you do a search on this, that you get a lot of Windows 7 Phone sites. Take screenshots with your Windows Phone | Windows Phone How-to (United States)

Now of course you do have the fact, that even Mozilla realized that the adoption rate on the W8 Phone was too low, to even come out with a browser for those devices. ww.wpcentral.com/firefox-windows-8-dead-company-cites-low-user-adoption

Mozilla even took away the ability to use Firefox in the Metro Interface on 8.x. This is from Feb. 27th this year. "

Microsoft Plans Price Cut for Windows Phone 8 Licenses"

"In a bid to spur adoption, Microsoft is reportedly preparing to take an ax to the fee it charges OEMs for Windows Phone 8 licenses.
Microsoft is reportedly on the verge of slashing Windows Phone 8 licensing fees, a move that may help the company make gains against Android and iOS, the current mobile operating system champs. The software giant is said to be ​

mulling a similar gambit

to shore up OEM support for low-cost Windows 8.1 tablets and other devices.During Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, Infosonics CEO Joseph Ram Sascha Segan ​

told

​

PCMag

that his company is "hearing Microsoft will drop the license fee quite a bit, as far as 70 percent, which will make their product more competitive in terms of price." Infosonics is a provider of low-cost Android handsets to Latin American markets as well as unlocked devices for the United States.Windows Phone licenses cost between $23 and $30, ​

according

to handset maker ZTE. Ram also told ​

PCMag

, "We're seeing trends that Microsoft is working with major chip makers to create the right ecosystem to be able to bring cheaper products to market." He added that under the new pricing scheme, it wouldn't be hard to introduce Windows Phones that are price-competitive with Android.In a smartphone market currently dominated by Android devices like Samsung's popular Galaxy handsets and Apple's iPhone, Microsoft lags far behind. The company made a bold move to reverse its mobile fortunes, when in September, after months of rumors, it announced the ​

acquisition of Nokia's mobile hardware unit for $7.1 billion

. Nokia is Microsoft's premier Windows Phone partner."
​

Microsoft Plans Price Cut for Windows Phone 8 Licenses: Reports This is from the 28th of Feb. What we know about Windows Phone 8.1 so far From the 22nd of Feb. Windows 8 Devices Get Cheap - InformationWeek

 

[broe23]

Everything I have found. It is not users being illiterate that is killing Windows 8.x & W8 Phone. It is the devices with Microsoft's OS running on them, that is driving away customers to the other OS's.

 

[Lee]

Everything I have found. It is not users being illiterate that is killing Windows 8.x & W8 Phone. It is the devices with Microsoft's OS running on them, that is driving away customers to the other OS's.

Something tells me that you have a problem with anything Microsoft regardless of what it may be. . .

 

[whs]

Everything I have found. It is not users being illiterate that is killing Windows 8.x & W8 Phone. It is the devices with Microsoft's OS running on them, that is driving away customers to the other OS's.

Problem is that the alternatives are not really any brighter. You can always be enthusiastic about the products of the fruit company or Linux (like me), but that requires a big investment of money or acedemic power.

 

[broe23]

The good ole days, were when we did not have to deal with the garbage coming out of the likes of Microsoft.

You got it exactly - The sun shone all day in the summer, it snowed every Christmas eve, the rich were generous and the poor were noble. Then Bill Gates invented windows and suddenly we have global warming, missing planes and even poor old Gwyneth Paltrow has to separate. Yikes.

The problem is that Gates did not invent it. His hired help designed it. He just got up on the stage and thought that he was Steve Jobs, which he was not.

Then comes along Coke Head Blamer. He just destroyed the company beyond any recognition. Only thing that is really keeping MS afloat, is the little bit of Enterprise customers he has.

My state has been test benching a custom Linux distro, that they can roll out to all agencies, and are already migrating a lot of custom desktop apps to Web Browser based.

 

[adamf]

Broe23, I don't understand your point really. Is someone forcing you to use Windows? If not don't if you don't like it.

 

[Allison]

My feeling is that Win 8 and 8.1 revealed that many users are completely Windows illiterate despite the fact that they may have been using it for years. One small example, how many new Win 8 users don't know how to change the default program for opening a given file extension? They complain that they don't like the Metro app that opens to view photos but don't know how to change things to use the program they prefer.

My sister is one such user, she has been using Windows for many years (and DOS before that) yet still has trouble copying files from one folder to another on her computer.

That makes me incredibly sad. My computer illiterate mother (49 turning 50) who gets me to do just about everything knows how to copy to a new folder. And this is the woman who killed our Windows 98 machine deleting system files to uninstall anti-virus software. I hated the default option that you have to change at the start but switching the default program and getting the computer to recognize new program options is fairly simple stuff.

 

[broe23]

Everything I have found. It is not users being illiterate that is killing Windows 8.x & W8 Phone. It is the devices with Microsoft's OS running on them, that is driving away customers to the other OS's.

Problem is that the alternatives are not really any brighter. You can always be enthusiastic about the products of the fruit company or Linux (like me), but that requires a big investment of money or academic power.

Incorrect. The alternatives are brighter, because they are allowing the user to get back into being in control of the OS.

With iOS & Mac OS, it allows for what you do on Mac OS, to be capable of cross platformed over to the iOS devices. Same with Linux. What you can do on it, you can also do on Mac OS, iOS and Android. Once Apple brings the iTunes App store to the Android platform, it is all over.

The new lead for Apple, is finally realizing that there are users using alternative OS's, that want to be able to have access to the same items that iOS & Mac OS users have.

Look at Steam. They finally saw the light of a niche market with the Linux users. Steam runs faster and better in Linux, then it does in Windows.

As for a big investment in Apple products. They are no more expensive then top of the line PC units which is what keeps those companies selling economy based lines afloat.

Lets use the airlines & cruise lines as an example. It is not the flyers wanting a $200-350 one way ticket, or people wanting to go on a cruise with the $400-600 per person tickets & packages that keeps them going. It is those going for the highest priced tickets and paying large sums of money on the cruises, that pay the bills for the companies.

Right now I can pick up a Mac Book for under $1,000.00, that will do everything that a $1500 Laptop will do and then some.

Microsoft did not see the markets that Apple saw. When Microsoft tried, they have fallen flat on their face. With the Xbox market, it was to keep up with Sony, due to there was no other competition other then the PC & Mac market out there for gaming.

Right now Sony is outselling Microsoft in more units then Microsoft ever realized.

As a Finance major in Business Management, I pay attention to this stuff. Otherwise if I told a customer or client that came to me, and decided to go elsewhere, due to I did not know what is going on. My business would not still be here.

To wrap up, here are a couple of links backing up why Sony is killing MS right now in the gaming market. SAPVoice: Why PS4 Is Selling Faster Than Xbox One - Forbes

This article was just released today at 4:24 EDT. MS has decided to slash the Xbox One by $50, thinking that it will generate failing sales. Microsoft Cuts Xbox One Price by $50 to Increase Sales : Tech/Biz : Auto World News No what MS problem is. Is that they messed up rushing the platform to release it when Sony did. But also released units that failed out of the gates. They either were meant to be only for test purposes in house, or had bad hard drives and/or disc drives.

February Sales numbers for PS4 vs. Xbox One. PS4 spanks Xbox One in early 2014 sales | Product Reviews Net From the 22nd this month, regarding Surface sales. Are Microsoft Corporation's Surface Sales About to Fall Off a Cliff? (AAPL, MSFT, SSNLF)

You still have speculators that keep stating that Microsoft is going to overtake Apple in 3 years. They state that every year. Guess what. Apple is still killing Microsoft in all markets, same as Sony is killing Microsoft in the Gaming market. Microsoft had their chance, but Gates & Ballmer thought otherwise that they would try for the consumer market that was looking for what they thought in their eyes as cheap and easy to use software & hardware.

The biggest problems are that MS has had to go out and buy up companies that wrote software, due to their engineers could not figure out how to do it, or it infringed on the copyrights of the competition. So why not just buy them out. They never got the hardware division figured out. Look at all of the problems with the Xbox 360. Still having them with the Xbox One. They had to slice the cost of OS & the Surface last year, due to they could not even give the stuff away.

Even when they gave hardware away and OS along with other software away, user adoption failed to show the numbers that MS Sales & Marketing department wanted.

 

[whs]

Yeah, for a niche market you may be right. But iTunes and Steam are not going to win the day. Which corporation or goverment agency that installs PCs by the thousands cares about e.g. Steam. And those are the places where most systems go.

Many goverment or local agencies have tried to go with Linux but quickly found out that this is not so easy and the transition costs a fortune. Migrating up in Windows is not cheap either (especially the education cost), but it is the less expensive alternative with less upheaval.

I think Microsoft is safe for quite a while and by then they will have figured something out. Thier legacy is too heavy for others to make real inroads.

 

[Coke Robot]

Well, look at this way, out of all the operating systems out there what is the one that has a lot of features and is something you really should learn how to use? Windows.

The main selling point about ios (android to a very slight degree, VERY slight degree) is that it's "easy" to use. That simplicity of use basically means that its features are so cut and dry and limited that it doesn't require a Help section or app like Windows Phone and Windows always has had. Things like right clicking, double and single clicking, middling clicking, drop down menus, multitasking, multiple windows, everything that makes Windows Windows is nonexistent on ios. So this means, it's "easy" to use and learn how to use because it's point and tap for everything (Windows 3); but as we all know ios is horribly limited in features that won't EVER replace Windows for those who use and know of those features. On a side note, apps that set up wifi hotspots, manage your checkbook, and able to print to certain printers are just dumbed down simpleton things that Windows and Office have ALWAYS been doing since day one. Things like Prezi are popular to use because it's a horribly dumbed down PowerPoint. I can compile a PowerPoint so advanced and awe inspiring but that's because I KNOW how to use it. All of those other things take no user involvement to use.

As for the forum posts of illiterate Windows users, get used it. It was the VERY exact same thing in the Seven Forums in its time. It's something that has ALWAYS been around for ages. It could also very well be people that grew up more around the cell phone age and have lost the ability to type full works such as because, cause, right, for, etcetera and have bought a very inexpensive laptop and can't for the life them spend 15 minutes LEARNING how to use it but can spend 15 minutes complaining about it on twitter, facebook, reddit, and youtube on their apple iphone...

Personally, I feel it's more the latter but more or less people not thinking for themselves. And as someone who has worked retail, I can tell you this is good solid theory. If it's not idiot proof (think of the dumbest person you know, times it by 1,000 and breed it with an elephant; then and only then can it be fool proof, also good advice for developers) it's a horrible product. If it makes you look like an incompetent fool because you got caught up on such a simple detail, it's enough to piddle people off and bad mouth the product and manufacturer. Hate it say it, but that's really how it goes these days. Just look at all the technologies in cars now like lane departure warnings, blind spot warnings, cars that parallel park themselves. Why do you suppose those exist? Because people can't take it upon themselves to follow rules, develop skill, and keep their concentration on the road and not on something else.

Oh, if you look and user manuals for products these days, your intelligence might be slightly annoyed. "Why does my lawn mower not start? The gas tank is empty, solution, fill it with gas. Why does my lawn mower not bag grass properly? The bag is full, solution, empty the bag."

Too long; didn't read: People are just kind of stupid nowadays and can't think for themselves anymore. It's either someone else doing the thinking or a piece of a silicon.

 

[broe23]

Well Microsoft has gone and done it. They are finally allowing Apple to let iOS users use a product that they cannot even give away.

[h=1]Update: Microsoft unveils Office for iPad[/h]http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9247233/Update_Microsoft_unveils_Office_for_iPad

 

[broe23]

Yeah, for a niche market you may be right. But iTunes and Steam are not going to win the day. Which corporation or goverment agency that installs PCs by the thousands cares about e.g. Steam. And those are the places where most systems go.

Many goverment or local agencies have tried to go with Linux but quickly found out that this is not so easy and the transition costs a fortune. Migrating up in Windows is not cheap either (especially the education cost), but it is the less expensive alternative with less upheaval.

I think Microsoft is safe for quite a while and by then they will have figured something out. Thier legacy is too heavy for others to make real inroads.

Incorrect on Government and local agencies finding that migrating to Linux costs a fortune. Newsflash for you. The U.S. Military is using Linux to power the Drones, along with the stations that they use to control them from. Linux is also used in the Navy for Shipboard systems, along with workstations. Same with all other branches.

Moving from Windows to Linux cost them next to nothing. It is cheaper to maintain, due to no licensing costs are not as high as Microsoft charges. Moving a user from Windows to Linux is next to nothing.

Microsoft is not safe, due to they are seeing their bottom line disappear, due to the books are showing declining profits.

As for a niche market for Linux, Android OS, iOS, Mac OS. You are far from the truth on that. You are just making an attempt to make it sound like a very small metric uses those products. You would be surprised at the numbers. You would also be surprised that the largest category running Linux, is Network Gateways, NAS's, DVR's, TiVo's, Security Camera DVR's. The list goes on.

The others are here to stay. Microsoft is not going to be around much longer, due to they keep failing to see the movement that is happening towards the other side.

 

[broe23]

Coke Robot, sorry, but Android & iOS users, same as Linux do not need a help to figure out how to use the device. As for simplicity, they are far easier to use, then Windows products. I can place anyone off the street in front of a Linux desktop right now.

Within 10 minutes, they would be browsing the web, using Libre Office or Google Doc's, could watch a DVD, etc., without any extra help. There is no Metro Interface, the product is made by end users that see the difficulty that Microsoft has made their products, and have produced a product that is so easy. Your Grandmother could use Linux, an Android device or iOS device.

I handed my iPhone to my mother today to use. She did not need any help to figure out how to use it. Same when I gave her my Google Nexus 7 Tablet to play around with it, to see what it could do. She has not touched a tablet, computer or smartphone in quite some time.

The last time she had a computer in her home, was around five years ago. She has a degree in Computer Sciences, back when they were teaching Cobol & Fortran in the 70's at the College she received her Associate Degree from in 1978. My father is having me install Xubuntu on his desktop this weekend. Simply because he does not see a reason to pay ridiculous costs for Windows 7 or Windows 8.x. He also has a Bachelor Degree in Electronics and Computer programming. He spent over 35 years with the Telephone company writing programs in Unix, that are still being used even today to do certain tasks.

He has no problem with Windows, other then the straight fact that it is a resource hog. Lets add to this that my sister also works in IT for Seaworld, and deals with OpenSource all day long for their Database & POS system.

There are a lot of families, including audio entertainment enthusiasts that are making a leap to the dark side. Simply because Windows no longer gives them what they need or want, to do what they wish to do.

 

[whs]

No need to argue. I know all these nums. I have been in the IT business since 1961 and seen it all. There are always cases where you can try to prove one point or another. Let's see in 5 years how it plays out.

 

[Allison]

Well Microsoft has gone and done it. They are finally allowing Apple to let iOS users use a product that they cannot even give away.

Update: Microsoft unveils Office for iPad

Update: Microsoft unveils Office for iPad - Computerworld

They're giving Microsoft Office away- I'll just go tell my nearest shop they should give me my free copy then 'sarcasm'! Did you read the article? You still have to pay for a full functional copy or subscription to Office 365.

 

[whs]

Coke Robot, sorry, but Android & iOS users, same as Linux do not need a help to figure out how to use the device. As for simplicity, they are far easier to use, then Windows products. I can place anyone off the street in front of a Linux desktop right now.

You obviously have no idea how those systems are. I run 4 Linux systems, Android tablet, Windows 8.1, Vista, Windows 7, and W8P. The level of difficulty of use is exactly in that order - Linux is the most difficult and W8P is the easiest..

 

[broe23]

No need to argue. I know all these nums. I have been in the IT business since 1961 and seen it all. There are always cases where you can try to prove one point or another. Let's see in 5 years how it plays out.

The problem is that Microsoft will not be around in five years.

 

[broe23]

Coke Robot, sorry, but Android & iOS users, same as Linux do not need a help to figure out how to use the device. As for simplicity, they are far easier to use, then Windows products. I can place anyone off the street in front of a Linux desktop right now.

You obviously have no idea how those systems are. I run 4 Linux systems, Android tablet, Windows 8.1, Vista, Windows 7, and W8P. The level of difficulty of use is exactly in that order - Linux is the most difficult and W8P is the easiest..

Sorry, but you have it backwards. But then again, who is to tell you when it is obvious that you will hang on to Windows, until they are no longer manufacturing software.

I have to adapt, because of what I do, and the fact that I do not have to deal with cleaning up other people's mess, when they go to some site. I have more infections from users of Microsoft products, then I do with Apple or even Linux. The later two being that those so called malware out there, have to have the user run or allow the trojan, which can be stopped, by knowing how to make the system to not allow.

You cannot do that with Windows. Microsoft has made it so that you cannot stop the unit from being infected by the end user, no matter what precautions you take as a System Admin.