Sunday, April 8, 2018

Breaking Up with my smartphone

DEAR
I love Microsoft, I want Bill Gates to be my friend so I can just give him a hug. I don’t want his money, I don’t want anything else … just a hug. If some of his money fell into my pocket I’d not be sad about it, and might think about returning it, but that’s not the point of this post. I love everything about Microsoft, it’s humble beginnings of two friends wanting to use their shared knowledge to create something, literally anything. I love that their first big break happened cause Bill (he’s my friend I can call him Bill) told them they had a thing but they didn’t have a thing and they then had to create said thing to finish the deal. Talk about fake it until you make it huh?! I use the office suite daily in both my work life and home life, I’m actually using it now. I can’t imagine my life without Microsoft. I think Indesign is a fancy publisher application. I have the original X-box in my room and still use it on occasion when I can’t sleep. I also have the X-box 360 but admit I haven’t spent my money on the X-box 1 yet. Mostly cause the adult in me thinks it’s silly to pay for a new system when I haven’t really turned on the old system in many many many months, stupid adult me. I have always had a PC never a MAC and that’s not just because my father might disown me if I did. I just love the user interface, I love the compatibility I love all of it. I even have … brace yourself friends… the Windows Phone. This is my second Windows Phone actually, after my beloved Blackberry bit the dust one late August day. Confession time … I really really really really really really really really really really …. really miss my Blackberry. Really. Frankly the Blackberry was great but the track ball kept breaking. I replaced it about 15 times then said screw this but I admit that the track ball was the only thing wrong with that phone. When it was time to leap to a new system I leaped to the Windows Phone via Lumina products. I loved it. I loved how all my devices were suddenly connected, I didn’t have to import anything just put in my username and password and boom a phone was born a short time later. It was so simple and fantastic. It literally did everything I needed it to do ….. I loved it. To tell you the truth I can’t remember why I got rid of that one for the current phone I have. Which is a newer version of the Windows Phone. I tell you all this in a preface to my letter to Microsoft explaining why I feel we need to finally part ways. It makes me sad, but as you will see below, I think it’s time. Please Bill don’t hate me, that would devastate me should we ever cross paths in the future.

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Dear Microsoft,

I hope this finds you doing well, I hope this finds you hard at work so that generations behind me won’t have to write a similar letter. I love my windows phone. I love how it connects to my office account, my one drive is great (tho I don’t use it the way others do), I kind of even like the e-mail program, but get super annoyed when you guys decide to update my ap and my settings go back to keeping my e-mail for 6 weeks then it will vanish off the face of the planet – not cool guys. Who the hell only needs 6 weeks worth of e-mails? Who is that person?  Or when you guys update A and it screws up B only to have another update fix both but screw up C. How about you just leave some stuff alone sometimes? Microsoft Edge has an issue with Pintress ? What? The only reason I know it’s Microsoft Edge is cause when you tell Edge to open the same page in Explorer it opens just fine. So what’s up with that !? I get an e-mail that you guys are changing the way you can make a screen shot or a snip. Really? That’s the priority of the hour at Microsoft. What you guys choose to prioritize drives me insane. For a few weeks there I couldn’t open a PDF without first downloading some 3rd party AP that requires me to download the PDF to the phone then open the ap then see the PDF. Really!? Seriously!? I mean the ENTIRE WORLD IS USING PDF EVERYWHERE … and I’m over here trying to chisel something out of stone.

A few months ago, I was going to a show, got my tickets digitally sent to me and I had to use PDF to open the tickets up with. I sent them to my friend on another system so that if I couldn’t open them she’d be able to. That was seriously something I was concerned about. I’d have been very angry had I not been able to see this show cause my stupid phone couldn’t open a PDF. (Side note: I understand this has now been corrected but yeah for a week or so was super annoying). How about allowing me to choose not to do that update …is that something we can talk about ? No … ok that’s cool, I guess.

What I don’t love and this is not really a slight on you, tho I guess that it is, is the fact that the rest of the planet could care less about my Microsoft phone. In a world moving to Aps the fact that you guys are so behind in that aspect really screws up my day to day life.  My office has an employee interface where you can download the ap and log in and see vacation time, news, etc., but guess what …. Not available for Windows Phone. There’s also this really awesome thing at my bank where I can make deposits from my house (cause I’m kind a lazy about that) check your balances, freeze cards if you think it’s lost or stolen but guess what else … Not available on Windows Phone. I’m not even talking about fun stuff yet. Dragon Con has a yearly ap that they create for the convention where you can see the schedule, news and announcements, changes in the schedule etc., but guess what …. Not Available on Windows Phone. Disney World for instance has a similar ap that you can link to your bracelet and change your fast passes, make reservations, etc but guess what … Not available for Windows Phone.

Are you seeing a pattern here ?! If it's not IOS or Android ... who gives a shit? sigh ....  I can’t tell you the number of times someone says, hey what’s your Snap Chat or insert some really cool game that everyone is playing … looking at you Simpson’s game … pokemon go etc., … or a friend sends me some avatar thing and they are like make one of yourself it’s awesome and I have to say, oh my phone doesn’t have that. They say oh really what do you have then I tell them and they laugh and laugh and laugh. Me yelling but I can make changes to a powerpoint file in a snap makes them laugh harder. I guess my point is that well …. It’s real frustrating. I could name more but don’t want to harp ….you know what’s missing, and even some of the ones you have in beta form never leave the format. It’s like they created it to get you off their back then abandoned the thing all together, all too common in the Ap store btw abandoned aps.  
That is why Microsoft I think it’s time to part ways, I’ve held to this device for far longer than I should have. I have recently received some money I wasn’t expecting and have decided to spend some of it on a new phone. My only criteria for this new phone is that it not be a windows phone and that it must have the Type C connection cause I have a billion of those wires and I’m not replacing them all again. That’s it. Those are the two things I’m basing this very important decision on. I don’t really want to abandon my Windows phone, but I’m afraid that the decision is out of my hands. I don’t see this situation correcting itself in the future and I don’t see that you are very invested in correcting it for the world. I mean there are reports that you are thinking of abandoning aps all together for some web based system. Really?! It’s like you guys see the rest of the world going left and are like nope we are going to go in a zig zag patter towards the left instead. 
It’s funny though, I’ve thought several times that users of other devices wouldn’t put up with this. Iphone users would freak out if suddenly the Ap store was not “working” at random intervals or had major missing aps in it. They would put on their black turtle necks and storm the “Apple” store for answers. We just sit over here going, don’t worry they will fix it, let’s go read a book while we wait. So maybe it’s not your fault Microsoft, it’s our fault for not demanding a better product. For not demanding that the Dragon Cons, Disney and Banking institutions treat us all as equals, then again why should they cater to the few when the many are happy. It’s a supply and demand thing and frankly the supply isn’t worth the hassle anymore. All of the phones basically do the same thing it just depends on which devil you want to get into bed with. At the end of the day after a few weeks/months you’ll get used to whatever device you choose.


So which phone am I abandoning you for …. That I haven’t decided yet. Notice BTW when I searched for a picture showing many phones various types the one not shown. They are all basically the same now it just depends on the interface really. I guess if I broke the phone today … I’d go with Samsung, likely the 9+. I just don’t see myself going all insane and going with an Iphone mostly cause I’m not a fan of their interface, their clientele, and their inability to really connect with non MAC products. I think if I go that route then in less than say 5 years I’ll be in the same boat I’m in now. The Samsung I’m familiar with because I have friends that have it, so I like the interface and other than the “google” connection it seems to function very similar to my Windows phone. Plus if I buy it through Microsoft it comes with the Microsoft ap installed which makes it work very similar to the phone I used to have …. Giving me the best of both worlds, at least until the world decides to take the Microsoft phone seriously. Sigh ….. wish that were today.

Thanks,

Marcy (a good friend of Bill’s)

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So readers what phone do you have?! Do you have similar frustrations?! Everyone has an opinion on the phone they have or the one they think you should have … let’s hear it!

Marcy (@beaslma)