I’ve been covering Microsoft in the tablet space since tablets first arrived on the scene in 2002 / 2003. I’m also a Microsoft MVP and have had the privilege of meeting with many on the former Windows Tablet team. I’ve written about tablets, reviewed them, carried them everywhere I shouldn’t, taken gobs of notes on them, and evangelized them to friends and customers. I love the tablet experience. Along the way I even managed to convert several of my customers to windows-based tablets, but the experience never got ingrained because of one thing: windows and the tablet experience never went together well. It wasn’t a natural experience. Sure, handwriting recognition was superb, but the whole experience from day one felt pieced together and was never integrated throughout the entire Windows UI ecosystem. It was that way in Windows XP Tablet Edition and it continues to be that way in Windows 7.
In 2010, Apple came along and redefined the tablet and did in one year what Microsoft could not do in 8+ years. AT CES 2011, guess what Microsoft was demoing? The fact that you could use Windows-based apps and handwrite on the tablet and not mess up the ink – yes, the exact same story they’ve been yelling from the top of their lungs from the early days that nobody was interested in hearing about. The problem is that nobody cares that you can run Windows-based apps on tablets. They don’t want Windows-based apps on tablets. They want apps DESIGNED for a tablet to run on a tablet. They want their tablet to feel natural and Microsoft’s Natural User Interface push on Windows ain’t working for them.
Engadget summed up Microsoft’s CES 2011 keynote superbly: the sound you hear is Microsoft missing yet another tablet cycle. It will be owned by Apple and Google for the next foreseeable future. Microsoft has slumbered into the same abyss they found themselves in with Windows Mobile, and it will take them years to recover unless they act swiftly and listen to what people are telling them.
We don’t want a Windows-based tablet. Never have. Never will. Consumers don’t want it. Businesses don’t want it. Get your Windows Phone 7 OS on a tablet – now. Gain tremendous advantage by integrating your handwriting recognition and ink expertise into the whole Windows Phone OS. I love your Windows Phone 7. I want a larger version of it. I want to read on it. I want to write apps for it. I want to take handwritten notes on it while I’m in a meeting. I want that as a tablet. Many others do, too.
Take your fingers out of your ears, Microsoft, and listen.
[...] posted a piece about Microsoft and Tablets that I sure hope somebody at Microsoft reads. Here’s the link. Go read it. Especially if you work at [...]
> We don’t want a Windows-based tablet.
> Never have. Never will. Consumers don’t
> want it.
Please speak for yourself. There are those of us who have no interest in running dumbed down toy “apps” mobilely. I have apps that I run on my desktop and notebook and I want to run those same apps on my HP Slate 500 and similar machines. Toy tablets are of no interest to me, whether its iPad, Android, or even Windows 7 without an active digitizer. As one IT manager I talked to in Wendy’s said to me, iPads are really great at running non-work related stuff. I’m not interseted in running Angry Birds. I want the full power of Word, One Note, Logos 4, Excel, FrameMaker, Photoshop, Bibble, etc.
At least you don’t feel strongly about it.
Sound advice. Keep it up. The seeds you plant may be watered by someone, but maybe eventually someone down the line will reap the harvest.
Happy new year, man.
I understand your point Jeff, but the marketplace disagrees with you. That said, will there continue to be a business need for tablet / handwriting reco functionality on windows-based tablets? absolutely. But Microsoft is trying to shove their preferred use case down a public’s throat that doesn’t want it. They are telling Microsoft how they want to use tablets and Microsoft doesn’t want to listen.
Jeff has a good point. I rely tremendously on OneNote, Excel, Word, SQL Server views and stored procedures. I want a Tablet PC that will meet those needs.
I am also really excited about WP 7 and I hope that will blaze a new future where personal and business information where co-exist.
The key is how well you can transition between your work life and personal life.
One key point you’re missing here is that Microsoft’s vision, flawed or not, had a pretty high price of entry that kept a lot of people away. I’m a big tablet user and everyone that has seen my HP convertable loves it, until they hear that they start around $1700. That’s a pretty tough sell against a $300 netbook or $700 iPad.
If MS and its hardware partners could sell these for $5-800 (which it seems they’re finally trying, about 3 years too late) they could make some more inroads and be half way there.
If they could deploy a software layer that looked anything like Courier and actually marketed it well, they might hit one out of the park.