 Microsoft-approved |
Like many large companies, Microsoft has been trimming costs in places in response to the global economic downturn…It also means scaling back perks. On the chopping block? Apple iPhone, RIM BlackBerry and Palm Pre service plans.
Regardless if the iPhone or BlackBerry is used for work purposes, Microsoft says if an employee wants to use one, it’s on his or her own dime, according to Business Insider.
The only phones Microsoft will pay for? Windows Mobile-powered smartphones, naturally.
Many companies do not reimburse employees for personal mobile devices, but that wasn’t the case at Microsoft (until now)…But questions remain about the move, such as:
If it didn’t affect that many staffers, why make the move at all? Just how much money is Microsoft saving if employees pay for the phones?
Aren’t data plans fairly similar in price?
If Windows Mobile is deemed inferior to the competition, what’s the use? Why frustrate employees?
The policy…poses less a financial question than a cultural one: if Microsoft employees don’t naturally gravitate toward in-house devices (say, the way Google employees do), isn’t that indicative that more work must be done in the mobile department?
Would Microsoft make a decision like this for petty reasons?.
Geez, way to take a normal corporate policy and make it look like Inhuman Oppression.
It’s perfectly natural to ask that if the company pays for your phone, it should use your OS. If an MS employee is seen using an iPhone, you guys would be the first to yell “Gotcha”.
If you sell Chevys, drive one. If you sell MS software or devices, use them. I believe that Apple has the same policies.
The best thing about this is it gives MS a strong incentive to improve their products….they have to use them.
China is putting out a very interesting WinMo phone called the M88. It’s actually somewhat affordable without contract:
http://miphone.tk
I think it’s more of a pride thing then saving money. It’s the whole “we’re supposed to be #1 so everyone should be using our products” I sbet they still sit around the old black and white tv talking about the good times before the great depression and anti-trust breakups of yore.
Speaking of donkey turds, that Pedro really sucks hard on the Microsoft tit.
Been using Windows Mobile phones for years, absolutely love them. They have been able to do everything that iPhones can do for so long now. Kind of funny that it took Apple so long to put in a copy and paste feature. That is a pretty basic function and was there in the first iteration of the Windows Mobile phone software.
Seriously, much better than the competition. Microsoft’s problem has always been their marketing and the price of the Windows OS lately.
Clottenhamr.. If that’s so, then please explain why the iPhone at 8% of market commands 90% of the web pages accessed by mobile smartphones?
None of the Windows Immobile devices I have owned have ever been anywhere as usable as my wife’s iPhone.
In fact all have been complete garbage in comparison.
From the company that brought us ActiveX and Windows Vista/7 Starter Edition, this doesn’t actually surprise me. More examples of how MSFT does have a clue what the consumer wants, or cares…
Win Mobile is on it’s last legs as far as I can see. When they gave up on releasing WinMo7 anytime soon (no hardware could run it) they threw in the towel. What surprises me is how Nokia is stumbling in smart phones (they do own the regular hand set market) giving it up to BlackBerry, Apple, Android, and even Palm. The N97 is a brick.
Canuck:
I was purely basing my opinion on features. WinMo has had all that the iPhone has had for a long, long time. You cannot deny that. If you or your wife have a hard time accessing the internet with WinMo phones then of course you need Apple to hold your hand and make it easy for you to do so. I have never had a problem doing such a simple task.
MSFT is becoming the IBM of old, another has been company.
Good way to increase navel-gazing and become more out of touch with the competition. That whole not-driving-Nissans-to-the-GM-plant strategy worked just as well.
#29 Actually a large chested naughty nurse gives me a full body sponge bath each and every time I power up my iPhone. Swear to God.
Clottenhamr – features is one thing. Ones that actually work on a Windows Immobile phone is completely another. Accessing the internet is one thing but actually getting pages to display corrrectly or able to make associated links in another. Even our IT department bemoans the dreadful selection of Windows Immobile phones available through our IP. My opinion of these phones is mild compared to theirs.
I have Telus HTC Touch Pro has some of the most absurd feature imaginable. The unchangeable response to email is “reply all”. The phone screen blacks out the instant your call connects, even while accessing voicemail where the keyboard is retrieved by push the on button> phone button>and finally the keyboard button, where the voice mail system says”are you still there?” or times out. More than 10 previos numbers in the call cache locks the phone up for about six to ten seconds after the call and I could go on. There are dozens on staff who have refused to use the company provided windows immobile phone and have bought their own iPhones and rave to the rest of us daily as we struggle with our windows garbage.
To paraphrase “The Onion”
“It remains to be seen if the iPhone will catch on in the business world where people use phones for actual work and not just dikking around.”
MicroSoft, building the love. One telephone at a time.
#24 So, badmouthing macfans is defending MS. I think you have to make a lot more reflection on the subject, Sister Mary
#26 Because you cannot ride bicycles if they don’t have training wheels?
#33 That is, until someone calls you and you lose all your job. Amazing device.
This is not news. This is standard practice in a lot places.
This may be standard practice in many companies, like GM for example, and look where that got them. In the 1970s a GM manager would be fired for buying a Japanese car, but at Toyota the company BOUGHT their managers American cars to drive. Microsoft’s move is the height of myopia — and everyone loves to rag on Apple’s “reality distortion field”. Hah! Watch it, Mr. Balmer. I don’t think there’s any TARP money left for you.
its a nice idea,main thing is they should respect microsoft rules, its not a good idea to see the competitors for rocking in thier company too
Is it just me or is Steve Ballmer really just Dick Cheney’s long lost brother?