Matthew Roszak

Microsoft is offering cash and other resources to developers, in hopes of enticing them to build apps for its upcoming Windows Phone 7, according to online reports. The veracity of those reports was then implied in an email conversation with eWEEK.

“We are investing heavily in the developer community by offering as many resources as we can to help them be successful on our platform,” a Microsoft spokesperson wrote to eWEEK on July 14. “Where it makes sense we do co-fund strategic projects on a limited basis.”

Windows Phone 7 aggregates Web content and applications into subject-specific “Hubs” such as “Office” or “Games.” When released sometime near the end of 2010, the operating system will be paired with a new Windows Phone Marketplace, where developers will be able to submit five free applications (rising to $19.99 after that) along with an unlimited number of paid applications.

In a July 14 article, Bloomberg quoted Todd Brix, a senior director at Microsoft, as suggesting that the company would devote whatever resources necessary to draw developers into the fold: “We are investing a lot to attract developers big and small to Windows Phone 7 to let them understand what the opportunity is and provide as many resources as we can to help them be successful on our platform.”

In addition to resource-allocation, Microsoft has taken pains to sketch out the parameters of its upcoming mobile applications store for developers. During its TechEd conference in June, Microsoft issued a document on its Windows Phone for Developers Website clearly delineating its content policies. Inevitably, the company will ban applications that are libelous, slanderous, threatening or discriminatory; as well as those that promote hate speech, the use of illegal drugs and excessive alcohol consumption, and violence.

The question of what constitutes an acceptable app has bedeviled Apple’s popular App Store on occasion over the past few months, with the company retracting apps only to institute them after a groundswell of protest from users; in addition, some developers have questioned why their apps with borderline-explicit content were pulled from the store, while apps created by major corporations, with similar content, were allowed to remain in place.

Microsoft seems to be taking a lesson from Apple’s issues.

“Philosophically our approach with Marketplace is in line with what’s existed for Windows Phone traditionally, and for Windows Mobile 6.5,” Casey McGee, a spokesperson for Microsoft, told eWEEK in a July 13 interview at WPC. “What we’ve sought to do with Windows Phone is be very transparent—here are what the fees are going to look like, etcetera, and here are the guidelines.”

For any controversial apps, McGee said, Microsoft will attempt to make their decision-making process as see-through as possible: “There’s a lot of subjectivity in the guidelines, and there will be judgment calls, but there will be an attempt to be consistent.”

Microsoft’s share of the smartphone operating-system market has been gradually corroding over the past several quarters, increasing the pressure on Windows Phone 7 to be a hit—something that depends on its various software and hardware components working as perfectly as possible from the outset.

“All the stuff has to work pretty well, it has to be quick, it has to be stable,” McGee added. “We need to launch with a Marketplace that shows we have a variety of applications that can be used on a daily basis.”

A notable portion of Microsoft’s Worldwide Partner Conference, running from July 11-15 in Washington, D.C., has focused on Windows Phone 7.

“The phone is going through a massive inflection point,” Andy Lees, senior vice president of Microsoft’s Mobile Communications Business, told an audience gathered in the Verizon Center here July 13. “There’s this immense competition but in many respects, things are just beginning.”

Microsoft’s strategy behind Windows Phone 7, he added, centers on three tenets: smart design, integrated experiences, and an optimized ecosystem. “The problem is that smartphones are just app launchers; they’re a grid of icons,” Lees said. “We figured there’s got to be a better way than going app by app by app, so two years ago we fundamentally reset our strategy.”

On July 13, Day Three of the conference, Microsoft released Windows Phone Developer Tools Beta.

“The term ‘beta’ is understood to mean that things are close to finished,” Brandon Watson, Microsoft’s director of developer experience for Windows Phone 7, wrote in a July 12 posting on The Windows Phone Developer Blog. “It’s time to get serious about building the actual apps and games for Windows Phone 7 that consumers will be looking for starting this holiday season.”

And in Microsoft’s view, if that takes a little co-funding, so be it.

http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Windows/Microsoft-CoFunding-Windows-Phone-7-Developers-513801/?kc=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+RSS%2Ftech+%28eWEEK+Technology+News%29

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