Microsoft’s Ben Rudolph was at CES this week challenging all comers to take the “Smoked by a Windows Phone $100 challenge.” According to The Verge, Microsoft had 30 wins, 3 losses, and 1 draw.
Too bad I wasn’t there to take the challenge. Ben is a good friend, but I’d still beat him.
Here are two videos — one win, one loss for Microsoft.
Of course, for the second video, the mark could have opened the Facebook app first, and shot & tagged the photo from there which would have saved multiple steps…
yes but it is about intuitive interface… 😉 (not having to start anything explicitly just start with what you want to do….taking a photo!).
In the first video, the winner could’ve even finished faster if he had swiped left-to-right after taking the picture.
Pretty smart promotion.
Also: instant narcissism.
Windows Phone 7 I’m sure would be faster posting to Facebook anyway but really that second video only proves that the guy with the iPhone doesn’t really know how to use his phone properly.
I took the challenge using Siri but only lost because of the couple extra seconds it took it to connect on the show floor. Ben, on the other hand, was furiously pounding away trying to win, as I let my phone do everything for me.
This. Why are they comparing a 2-app process on the iPhone when you can just post and tag photos direct from within the Facebook app?
What’s the CPU speed? How much RAM? What kind of conducting material in the CPUs? Gallium? Silicon? Is the screen “green”?
These are the things that matter to me, and it’s sad that Microsoft doesn’t adorn their packaging with bullet points that answer my questions about which features are in their products.
Lets just concentrate on the facts: over 30 wins, 1 tie and only 3 losses…
I’m sorry, but you can shave your head and act loose, but Windows is still Windows; Microsoft is still Microsoft; and it just isn’t cool.
I love the sarcasm
The Microsoft employee got to decide what the tasks were. So of course he cherry picked things which the Windows Phone UI does quickly, and didn’t challenge on things it does more slowly than the competition.
And he then spent the week before CES making sure he had the fastest possible methods memorised. Those people he challenged had to work out how to do the task as they went along.
If an Apple or a Google employee did the same stunt, they too would will all or nearly all of their choice of challenges.
And I’ll lose a race to Lance Armstrong.
The “contest” doesn’t really prove anything.
Irrelevant. What’s relevant is whether new Windows phones work well and deliver on what they’re promising. This is one of the first products I’ve seen from Microsoft in a long time that has me interested, because they seem to be getting it right the first time.
Win or lose, this is still one of the better marketing ideas I’ve seen come out of MS in a long time.
The contest is about educating people about Windows Phone 7 and its ease of use.
I actually hope Windows Phone 7 takes off. iOS needs a serious contender.
You got to just say something and wait? I call that a win for you.
As much as I like iOS, this is a great way to promote Windows Phone. The sharing process seems a lot more intuitive.
Yes: the facts that a person trained in the fastest ways to perform various tasks beat random people who haven’t taken speed smartphone classes.
Windows phone might be very fast, I’m not dissing it at all, but it’s safe to say the guy working for Microsoft was well practiced and prepared going into this challenge.
What about challenging him back lets see who can update all of their apps faster or something?
I think it’s typical Microsoft personally. This type of marketing doesn’t make Win phone any cooler which is the real battle it’s facing in the market place.
Show me the video where Windows Phone 7 posts a photo to Instagram faster than an iPhone… oh wait. And that’s the problem. 😉
And that’s it. When you say ‘Windows Phone’, what comes to mind? Not.Cool. If they called it ‘Metro Phone’ (or anything with ‘Metro’ as the lead), it would be more of a curio of sorts; maybe even…
…cool.
Chuck Norris will kick his butt.
Agreed! I have no idea why he didn’t launch FB first, THEN snap the photo. There was no need to ever open the camera app.
Oh well. Windows phone does seem quite nice.
Agreed. I was immediately put off when the name was announced as “Windows Phone 7 Series,” which is just ridiculous.
It does reveal a certain conceit at Microsoft, namely that they think in terms of competition. Their mentality is tied to it, to using others as a point of reference.
One, one more thing: if Windows Phone does take off, it will be because of Nokia as much as Microsoft. After all, part of the iPhone’s success lies in the tight integration of hardware and software.
Well presumably the person using the ‘other’ phone is using it the best way *they* know how to, not the best way you or I or anyone else here knows how to.
Well that’s my point. They are comparing a process with at least 2 variables (phone interface and operator proficiency) and then claiming that any victories are always attributable to the first variable.
As someone commented above, the MS guy has undoubtedly practised and drilled the process so that he can do it as quickly as possible.
Because Chuck Norris uses Windows Phone 😛 ?
I agree with you. The contest reveals a lot about Microsoft’s ethos.
Compare to Apple’s approach: Jobs once said (when he chastised the Apple faithful) something like ‘you have to stop thinking that for Apple to win, Microsoft [or anyone else] has to lose’.Microsoft has so far done a great job with Win Phone 7 and the partnership with Nokia seems to be working well. I know it’s a bit of fun but surely there are better ways to raise the profile of WP7 than some Biff-like guy (Back to the Future) bulldozering some unsuspecting iPhone owners in some contest they’re ill-prepared for…
As a 15-yr long user of Macs and Apple “stuff”, I got my Windows Phone about 6 months ago and I think it’s the best gadget I’ve ever owned.
I think the point the video makes is that from a standing home-screen start, the Windows Phone is quicker. I don’t know how many time I’ve outrun my iPhone4-owning friends at simple tasks on my phone.
From what I’ve read there were 10 scenarios to choose from like “upload a picture to twitter” which the contestant could choose from. With Windows Phone you don’t have to spend a week memorising things, or spend any time for that matter. It’s as simple as taking a photo and sharing it to twitter or facebook. If using WP7 you have to memorise stuff then you probably are have something wrong with you.
You could do the same thing in 5 minutes, no practice required.
Cycling is not that hard. Your example would prove Lance is better than you at cycling, Lance has a better bicycle, or both. Handling smartphones should not be that hard. In fact, it should be smart.
Windows Phone is not better at everything for everyone. However, these challenges prove Windows Phone completes certain common tasks faster than iOS and Android on flagship hardware.
So Windows Phone is technically faster, considering the ‘old and slow’ spec hardware supported, ‘smarter’ or easier for mere mortals, considering the challenges, or all of the above.
It was a race (fastest wins) though and it was slower than typing… That doesn’t sound like a win to me, it would make the Olympics more interesting if that’s how races are won there though.
You don’t need training to use a Windows Phone.
They could have watched other people take the challenge and practised, but that’s not something you need to do on Windows Phone.
I understand. This is marketing. However, what is there to train?
Are you saying these simple and common tasks require training on iOS and Android? How smart is that?
On all platforms, including Windows Phone, training/practice will result in faster task achievement.
pff this would be easy to win – just suggest a task that requires one of the hundreds of thousands of iOS apps that WP doesn’t have.
That is true.
I prefer “robust and optimised” rather than “old and slow” 😛
Sure, let’s go with that 😉
Counter challenge: $100 for the first person to find 5 awesome apps that are exclusive to their platform. “Awesome” is defined as having sales of over $1M. Give him a 10 minute head start, just to make it fair.
Of course Microsoft is going to go for this kind of bald-headed, testosterone fueled challenge. As in other, more private areas of life, speed and quality aren’t the same things.
Then they should have had somebody who has never used a Windows phone representing the Windows phone side of the challenge to make it fair.
Right?
Using Ben Rudolph as the Windows phone guy is the equivalent of using Scott Forstall to do the same challenge on the iPhone.
Chuck Norris doesn’t need any phone. He just talks, and his target hears him wherever he is.
Since you can post photos to Facebook through either email or MMS, and since you can send a photo both ways directly from the iPhone camera app, that would’ve been the smart way for the challenger to go. This method would still allow the iPhone to leverage the instant camera app access from the lock screen (which is quicker than launching the Facebook app).
Interesting. In your world, practice doesn’t make you faster at doing things? Because for everyone else on the planet, the speed at which we do things is not decided solely (or even mostly) by our phone’s OS.
This is a cute demo, and the Lumia 900 looks like a cool phone. But it’s strange that MS’s old, failed marketing strategy for Windows Phone was “I can take a picture faster than you can!” Now for the new, improved Windows Phone the winning marketing strategy is going to be…more of the same.
That should work.
I actually like the idea, but it wouldn’t be fair since the competitor used their own phone (and I would think be familiar with it).
What would be fair would be to have a blackberry owner (for example) pick a phone at random from a selection of other devices (excluding a WP7 device or BB). He would do (or try to do) one of the tasks like upload a photo to twitter and then try on a WP7 device while being timed. I’m not sure what the competitive element would be, but it would at least be a better test for usability.
Now you’re trying to make the argument that an average person who owns a phone should be just as good at using one as a guy who literally knows everything about it, and what the fastest way is to accomplish any given task, because he works for the company that made it.
That’s a terrible argument, which is why I said it was the equivalent of Scott Forstall doing the same thing with iOS. If he ran the same challenge and got an average yutz with a Windows phone to try to beat him in a challenge to see who could upload a picture faster, who do you think would win?
Not the guy with the Windows phone, I’ll tell you that much. it’s a loaded challenge, biased towards the person who knows the most about their phone, it’s not about the phone itself.
Practice helps, but seriously, uploading a photo to twitter (from WP7) takes two steps from the lock screen (take photo > share). How long could you drag that out for?
Runners practice running, but they eventually reach a plateau where they cannot go any faster or improve their form; in some scenarios WP7 (I’m not saying WP7 is great at everything) is so effective at what it does that a new user shouldn’t take much longer than someone who has used it before thus practice isn’t going to give a worthwhile advantage.
I don’t know where you got the idea that smoked by windows phone is going to be a big marketing campaign, it seems like it was just a fun CES/Twitter thing.
All the first party software on the phone is dead simple to use, it’s just obvious. Third-party apps are sometimes more complicated and would require practice, or as I prefer to call it, “just using it”.
Out of all the challenges I would actually say the weather one was a bit of a cheat, he’d already pinned the tiles for the two cities; somewhat ironically he could have used TellMe to search for the weather in both cities exactly the same way as the iPhone guy.
They got to choose from common usage scenarios. It’s not like he’s gone:
Ben: “Do you post to status updates to Facebook”
Guy: “Never tried”
Ben: “Perfect, lets go!”
I don’t think I’d have any problem beating Scott Forstall any of those scenarios with my Titan (If I pre-pinned the weather I’d have him beat before he loaded up an app for that), I wouldn’t even need to practice. It’s not as if those challenges were device specific, they were pretty common that a lot of people would do on a regular basis.
Now if the scenario was “set a calendar appointment” then I’m sure someone with an iPhone 4S would destroy me, but I’m not going to whinge about them having cheated by using Siri, I’d just choose a scenario I was comfortable doing.
If you’re a noob at using your phone or only got it two days ago, why would you do the challenge?
Like I said before, from a usability testing POV getting a person who had never used WP7 and an Android to do the tests would be a better test.
5 minutes is practice, mate. People here were put on the spot.
I’d say it’s learning, practice suggests repetition. I wouldn’t say they were put on the spot, they knew the scenarios, they saw what was going on and they weren’t forced into it. I’d say they knew exactly what was going on and weren’t put on the spot. From what I read from an attendee who posted at the Verge they were allowed to do a warm up go off camera. I really don’t see how that could be considered unfair. One of the scenarios was to send a text message after all and does someone really need a warm up sending one of those?
So apparently the iPhone isn’t so intuitive after all.
In real life, I would actually take some time making the actual picture, framing it properly, maybe asking people for a smile, etc.. Often do a little post processing (there are great apps for that on iOS). The fact that subsequently sharing my picture takes a few seconds extra or less doesn’t matter at all.
I’ll be sticking with my iPhone, but being able to post to Facebook right from the camera roll is a clear advantage on the Windows Phone.
Yes, the guy COULD have opened up Facebook, taken the photo there and tagged it… but why SHOULD he have to?
This challenge was great marketing.
So what you’re saying is that iPhone users do nothing with their phone thats interesting so they aren’t fast at it?
And the loss posted wasn’t realistic. Who really has any non tech friends on Twitter? No one I know even knows what Twitter is! (Living in Holland).
MacBook Pro and iMac user. iPad owner.
But my next phone will be a Nokia 800.
Thirty wins for windows phone, two losses and one tie. 30-2-1. As good as Iphone and Android are no other mobile OS integrates social networking, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Windows Live so tightly into the OS. The Galaxy Nexus with its copy of the people hub doesn’t even do as much as WP7’s People’s Hub does.
Also the tiles put information right in front of you and the ability to not only pin apps to the Start screen but the ability to pin a component of the apps drilled levels down so that you are not only launching an app but the place in the app you want to launch.
WP7 does a great job of putting every everything right within reach and makes what are functions of separate apps on other OS’s actual fundamental components of the OS.
Another example of this is the dedicated Search button which launches BING, which has at bottom of th screen once you hi that button four buttons with dedicated functions. Local Scout which will find local venues for eat and drink, things to do , web options and images. The next button, again apart of BING tthus a part of the OSwill listen to music and identify it for you, display the CD cover which you can select to be taken directly to Zune Mrketplace and you can purchase tbe song or album, if you have the Zune pass you can listen(stream)to that song or any song on that album(or any album in Zune Marketplace for that matter) as frequently as desired. You can read about the artist, see related content and share the song with friends. This is all part of the OS, no install or launch of independent launch of a separate app required. The third component/button built into BING on WP7 is BING VISION which can read Barcodes, QR codes, Microsoft Tags, Book and CD covers and identify them and give you information about what it has scanned and price and location information where it can be purchased. BING VISION will also scan plain text and Translate it into a host of available languages. As part of my job I need to translate text and have actually found that functionality useful. The forth button is the microphone which allows you to speak to Bing to conduct a search. (Note holding the home button from any where on the phone or using Bluetooth also allows you to speak to the phone for voice commands,launching apps, sending texts, searching making calls, etc).
By utilizing the dedicated search button to launch BING, identifying music, scanning objects and text, finding local venues for food and activities and conducting search’s are always just two taps away, SEARCH BUTTON & SELECT BING FUNCTION regardless of where you are in your phone. No backing out of an app or swiping through pages of home screens or accessing folders required. TAP and TAP. You don’t need an app for that. Its part of the OS.
BING in WP7 in a sense “senses” or percives it’s environment. Knowledge via Local scout, Hearing via the Music Id funcrion, Sight via BING VISION.
Now if you would like to use an independent app for functions that are part of the OS you can download apps like Soundhound, Twitter apps, LinkedIn apps, Facebook apps, Apps like Yapf for finding local venues, etc. This provides options if you would like to use them and other apps like them.
Also built directly into messaging are Facebook Chat and Windows Live Messanger. The benefit of this is that any conversation that you are having with a freind or family member whether it is via text Windows Messanger or Facebook Chat stays within the context of o e conversation thread. For example if you are texting a friend who then puts their phone down and logs onto Facebook via their laptop, by hitting a small “switch” button at the bottom of your text window you will be brought to the other available of options for communication with that person whether it be Widows live ot Facbook chat and it will indicate whether or not they are available. Select Facebook Chat and continue seamlessly the conversation you were having with them via text.
The People’s Hub on Windows Phone 7 is a very strong feature. The People Hub takes Contacts and progresses it beyond the fundamental concept of simply “reaching” the person you want to talk to/text but allows you connect more easily with people by strong integration of social media, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Windows Live. First the Live Tile of the People Hub is “live” dynamically displaying the profile pictures of your contacts in a ever changing, aesthetically pleasing mosaic. (Initial setup simply requires, after purchasing your phone, simply logging into your social networks, your contacts are downloaded to the device with profile picture and other demographic information they made on their profile)Tapping the People Hub brings you into the hub where you are presented with your profile pic from Facebook with your most recent social media post(Twitter, FB…) to the left of you picture. Below this are any groups you have created to make communicating with certain people more efficient whether it is family, friends, vhurch members etc. Communicating in mass text or emails is made easy with groups. This feature, of grouping friends, has been recently copied in Android 4.0 with its Circles. Below groups is an alphabetized list of all of your contacts. There is an option to filter this list by displaying on Windows Live contacts(basic contacts), Facebook Contacts, Google contacts, LinkedIn contacts or any combination of them.
Swiping to the left shows “What’s New” . Any new posts,Tweets, posted or tweeted picture will be seen here. You can click on the to be taken to the tweet if it is a tweet, or to the deeper into the individual post where you can see comments, post your own, or “like”. This is all from within the People’s Hub. Backing back out to the main People Hub page and swiping to the left again brings you to “Recent”. This is a page with the live tiles of several of the most recent people you have communicated with or whose profiles you have interacted with.
Now from with the People Hub, either from the list of contacts or Recent section you can select an individual contact; and like the presentation of the main People Hub page the person you select profile picture will be displayed with their more recent post to the right of it. Below the picture is a host of contact and demographic information, again much of which may have been automatically downloaded from Facebook from initial setup.
You can see multiple phone numbers, Text and Chat(with the mediums that person uses to chat Windows Live or Facebook Chat or both giving you the option to chat with them via any of those methods in a seamless conversation as described ins previous post), email addresse(s), company(address may be present if part of public profile or personally added allow easy access to maps), birthday, significant other.
Swiping to the left show “What’s New” for that person, any recent posts, tweets that you can interact with, view comments, add comments, like.
Swiping to the left again brings you to their pictures. In this section the first thing you see is an aesthetically pleasing dynamic slideshow of some of the persons photos that are on their Facebook page.tapping the picture brings you into their a display of all of their Facebook photos as categorized on the Facebook page. You can tag photos from here or save photos to your device as well, comment on photos or like photos as well.
Backing out of the pics and swiping to the left again will bring you to your history in communication with that person, text, phone call,missed call chat, etc.
Since we are talking about pictures WP7 also has a Picture Hub where all of your pictures are stored.On the start screen you have a long rectangular live tile which give you access to this hub. There is an option to choose a background or shuffle a background from within the hub. If you chose a background one of your images from will be displayed on the tile on the start screen. If you choose shuffle the image cycles dynamically through some of your images in an aesthetically appealing slideshow right there on the live tile.
By tapping on the live tile you are taken into the hub which has as the background image one of your pictures. If you have selected “shuffle” this image will also change over time.
Now in the Pictures Hub you have four options Camera Roll, Albums, Date and People
Camera Roll are all of the pictures you have taken with the device. ALBUMS are your Facebook albums as categorized on Facebook and the photos you’ve uploaded to SkyDrive. The pictures from these two sources are displayed and accessed on the device as if they were actually stored on the device. Everything is transparent – the pictures from your camera roll are displayed as square tiles that you can click on and engage etc, the pictures in your albums, which are you Facebook and Skydrive pics are displayed is larger tiles/squares that have either SkyDrive in small white text at the bottom of it or the name of the Album as on Facebook on it. Tapping that brings you into the album and you can interact with the pictures in the same way previously described, tagging, commenting etc.
DATE-Selecting date allows you to view all of you pictures and videos whether from the camera roll or pictures saved to the phone from another source by date.
PEOPLE – brings you to a page of Large Tiles of people from your contacts which you can click on to see their Facebook albums. At the bottom of this list of Tiles is the option to choose a contact to be taken directly to a specific contact Facebook Album. Again this is all very seamless and transparent, viewing and navigating these albums has the feel that they are actually on the device because you are not required to launce a separate Facebbok application to view them. You are interested in viewing pictures so you go to you Pictures Hub and you can view and interact with not only your pictures but of also of the people you are connected to. Very intuitive and well integrated.
But that’s not all. We addressed selecting from the four options that are presenting in text form from the Picture Hub, but in line with the design of WP7 swiping to the left utilizes the panorama design of the UI and brings you to your “Favorites”. a few a few favorite pics(there is an option to make some of your save photos “favorites”) are displayed here. Below them is the option to “view all” – which when tapped allows you to see all of your favorites.
“What’s New”- Swiping left again brings you to “What’s New”. Again, here WP7 blurs the line between where the device ends and the internet begins. Here you see posted or tweeted pictures from your contacts. It’s all about picture in the Picture Hub, your own and of those people you are connected to.
Apps- swiping left again brings you to a list of apps, and not just any apps but apps that are associated with pictures. WP7 presents you, from within the Picture Hub with a list of apps that you van utilize to edit, manipulate, enhance your photos or view other photo sharing sites etc.
This particular function of presenting useful apps for a particular function is not limited to Pictures but can be found elsewhere on the OS as well.
The device can be set up for “quick share” to Facebook or Skydrive so that after you take a photo you can use the menu but to select “SHARE TO FACEBOOK or SHARE TO SKYDRIVE, whichever you have selected in your settings.
You can also select that pictures be automatically uploaded to either after you take a photo of you so desire.
WP7 does what no other mobile OS does in way of integration. The UI is very intuitive, FAST, SMOOTH and EASY to use.
The People’s Hub on Windows Phone 7 is a very strong feature. The People Hub takes Contacts and progresses it beyond the fundamental concept of simply “reaching” the person you want to talk to/text but allows you connect more easily with people by strong integration of social media, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Windows Live. First the Live Tile of the People Hub is “live” dynamically displaying the profile pictures of your contacts in a ever changing, aesthetically pleasing mosaic. (Initial setup simply requires, after purchasing your phone, simply logging into your social networks, your contacts are downloaded to the device with profile picture and other demographic information they made on their profile)Tapping the People Hub brings you into the hub where you are presented with your profile pic from Facebook with your most recent social media post(Twitter, FB…) to the left of you picture. Below this are any groups you have created to make communicating with certain people more efficient whether it is family, friends, vhurch members etc. Communicating in mass text or emails is made easy with groups. This feature, of grouping friends, has been recently copied in Android 4.0 with its Circles. Below groups is an alphabetized list of all of your contacts. There is an option to filter this list by displaying on Windows Live contacts(basic contacts), Facebook Contacts, Google contacts, LinkedIn contacts or any combination of them.
Swiping to the left shows “What’s New” . Any new posts,Tweets, posted or tweeted picture will be seen here. You can click on the to be taken to the tweet if it is a tweet, or to the deeper into the individual post where you can see comments, post your own, or “like”. This is all from within the People’s Hub. Backing back out to the main People Hub page and swiping to the left again brings you to “Recent”. This is a page with the live tiles of several of the most recent people you have communicated with or whose profiles you have interacted with.
Now from with the People Hub, either from the list of contacts or Recent section you can select an individual contact; and like the presentation of the main People Hub page the person you select profile picture will be displayed with their more recent post to the right of it. Below the picture is a host of contact and demographic information, again much of which may have been automatically downloaded from Facebook from initial setup.
You can see multiple phone numbers, Text and Chat(with the mediums that person uses to chat Windows Live or Facebook Chat or both giving you the option to chat with them via any of those methods in a seamless conversation as described ins previous post), email addresse(s), company(address may be present if part of public profile or personally added allow easy access to maps), birthday, significant other.
Swiping to the left show “What’s New” for that person, any recent posts, tweets that you can interact with, view comments, add comments, like.
Swiping to the left again brings you to their pictures. In this section the first thing you see is an aesthetically pleasing dynamic slideshow of some of the persons photos that are on their Facebook page.tapping the picture brings you into their a display of all of their Facebook photos as categorized on the Facebook page. You can tag photos from here or save photos to your device as well, comment on photos or like photos as well.
Backing out of the pics and swiping to the left again will bring you to your history in communication with that person, text, phone call,missed call chat, etc.
Since we are talking about pictures WP7 also has a Picture Hub where all of your pictures are stored.On the start screen you have a long rectangular live tile which give you access to this hub. There is an option to choose a background or shuffle a background from within the hub. If you chose a background one of your images from will be displayed on the tile on the start screen. If you choose shuffle the image cycles dynamically through some of your images in an aesthetically appealing slideshow right there on the live tile.
By tapping on the live tile you are taken into the hub which has as the background image one of your pictures. If you have selected “shuffle” this image will also change over time.
Now in the Pictures Hub you have four options Camera Roll, Albums, Date and People
Camera Roll are all of the pictures you have taken with the device. ALBUMS are your Facebook albums as categorized on Facebook and the photos you’ve uploaded to SkyDrive. The pictures from these two sources are displayed and accessed on the device as if they were actually stored on the device. Everything is transparent – the pictures from your camera roll are displayed as square tiles that you can click on and engage etc, the pictures in your albums, which are you Facebook and Skydrive pics are displayed is larger tiles/squares that have either SkyDrive in small white text at the bottom of it or the name of the Album as on Facebook on it. Tapping that brings you into the album and you can interact with the pictures in the same way previously described, tagging, commenting etc.
DATE-Selecting date allows you to view all of you pictures and videos whether from the camera roll or pictures saved to the phone from another source by date.
PEOPLE – brings you to a page of Large Tiles of people from your contacts which you can click on to see their Facebook albums. At the bottom of this list of Tiles is the option to choose a contact to be taken directly to a specific contact Facebook Album. Again this is all very seamless and transparent, viewing and navigating these albums has the feel that they are actually on the device because you are not required to launce a separate Facebbok application to view them. You are interested in viewing pictures so you go to you Pictures Hub and you can view and interact with not only your pictures but of also of the people you are connected to. Very intuitive and well integrated.
But that’s not all. We addressed selecting from the four options that are presenting in text form from the Picture Hub, but in line with the design of WP7 swiping to the left utilizes the panorama design of the UI and brings you to your “Favorites”. a few a few favorite pics(there is an option to make some of your save photos “favorites”) are displayed here. Below them is the option to “view all” – which when tapped allows you to see all of your favorites.
“What’s New”- Swiping left again brings you to “What’s New”. Again, here WP7 blurs the line between where the device ends and the internet begins. Here you see posted or tweeted pictures from your contacts. It’s all about picture in the Picture Hub, your own and of those people you are connected to.
Apps- swiping left again brings you to a list of apps, and not just any apps but apps that are associated with pictures. WP7 presents you, from within the Picture Hub with a list of apps that you van utilize to edit, manipulate, enhance your photos or view other photo sharing sites etc.
This particular function of presenting useful apps for a particular function is not limited to Pictures but can be found elsewhere on the OS as well.
The device can be set up for “quick share” to Facebook or Skydrive so that after you take a photo you can use the menu but to select “SHARE TO FACEBOOK or SHARE TO SKYDRIVE, whichever you have selected in your settings.
You can also select that pictures be automatically uploaded to either after you take a photo of you so desire.
WP7 does what no other mobile OS does in way of integration. The UI is very intuitive, FAST, SMOOTH and EASY to use.
Note: on a persons contact page along with the demographic information there is also an option to Post to their Wall.
You can also pin any contact or grip to the start screen. This will be a live tile that will transition from displaying their profile picture, their name and any posts texts or pictures they make.
There is also the “Me” tile which is also a live tile which when tapped displays your profile pic, last post and has three options below it POST A MESSAGE, CHECK IN, SET CHAT STATUS. Swiping to the left shows your notifications-comments people have made on your wall, or to pictures etc. This information is also displayed on the Live Tile when viewing ot from the Start screen
Swiping to the left again brings you to ” What’s New” which shows your red that you have made and tweets you recieved etc.
Please excuse all of the typos, I typed all of these posts on my HTC Titan but did not properly review them as I should have before posting. Thank you.
Thank you so much for spending your morning typing up a spec sheet for us. We are all so very edified and enlightened.
iOS is intuitive, it just doesn’t have facebook integration (maybe apple thinks facebook is cheap idk), that was just a choice they made.
It’s up to the facebook app with its iPhone camera integration that needed to be intuitive in this case.
In the case of Twitter, where iOS does have integration, the iPhone won remember
Wouldn’t a more obvious way of measuring it be to see the number of separate ‘clicks’ a user has to make?
You’re talking nonsense… WP7 is very intuative, no training is required !
I’m afraid my Lumia 800 is very cool 🙂
OK, who can make the quickest fart noise
You’re not very good at reading, are you? If no training is required, then why is Ben Rudolph the guy using the Windows phone in this challenge? Would he not have a distinctive advantage over anybody else, because of his direct involvement with Windows Phone at MS?
You’re suggesting anybody off the street who had never used a Windows phone before could have run the challenge instead of Rudolph, which is idiotic. That’s why I made the comparison with Scott Forstall doing the same thing on an iPhone. Did you miss that part, or did you just not understand it?
The only thing Rudolph is proving is that he is more competent at using Windows Phone because of his lengthy experience with it. And he still managed to lose against an iPhone user who doesn’t work for Apple. You know what that says? It says even a semi-competent iPhone user can use an iPhone to complete tasks faster than Microsoft’s own WP7 evangelist using Windows Phone.