Software People Inspiring

Any Old Iron?

Talking of the announcement today that Microsoft and Vodafone, those champions of open competition, will be teaming up to offer an alternative to Blackberry in the shape of Windows Mobile Email, the news story on BBCi made me chuckle for a number of reasons:

1. The straight-faced announcement of innovative new services like the ability to send and receive email using mobile devices, and edit Word and Excel documents
2. The fact that it made the news at all, considering

This is the Web 2.0 phenomenon all over again. The massive marketing hype surrounding Web 2.0 has failed to disguise the fact that we've had it for years already. Nobody can quite pinpoint what "Web 2.0" actually is, and when pushed we get hasty references to "RSS" and "AJAX" and similar stuff-we've-had-for-ages rubbish. Basically, Web 2.0 is an opportunity for us all to pay for Web 1.0 all over again before we realise we were using it already.

This announcement from Microsoft hides another very thinly disguised attempt to sell us second-hand ideas at as-new prices. "Windows Mobile Email"? So, basically it's a mobile computer which can access the web via a mobile phone. Hmmm. A bit like the one I paid £350 for back in 1999?

What ever will they think of next? How about "Windows Mobile Pencil & Paper"? Users will even be able to keep their Windows Mobile Paper up to date using a "Windows Mobile Eraser" (sold seperately).

---