Windows Phone boss ‘flattered’ by Android 4.0 copycat features

By on Oct 20, 2011 at 6:10 PM
mobile October 20, 2011

Microsoft’s head of Windows Phone Andy Lees recently said he was flattered by parts of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich that appear to mimic features of Windows Phone 7.5 (Mango). “It’s always flattering when someone starts copying you ,” Lees told CNETAsia. Perhaps one of the most noticeable similarities is Android’s new ‘People’ feature, which provides a snapshot of any contact’s social network status — it is nearly identical to what Windows Phone 7.5 offers with “People Hub.” Read on for more.

“Fundamentally, [Google's] point of view is different,” Lees explained. “They provide you with a grid of icons and a sea of applications and the more functionality you add, the more complicated and difficult to use the phone becomes.”

No doubt the home screens for each operating system are completely different; Android offers a widget and icon-based home screen while Microsoft has taken the tile-based Metro UI approach. Lees believes the Windows Phone user interface caters to developers better. “The problem with the Android model is that [if] somebody decides to do something, they hack up the operating system and they make it work,” Lees explained. “But that [makes] a dead end for that device, and that’s why phones don’t get updated, it’s why sometimes they run applications and sometimes they don’t.”

Thanks Callandor!

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  • Spoken Wordâ„¢

    Poor Microsoft. It must hurt so bad to be the odd OS out in a market that you once dominated.

    • http://profiles.google.com/lognvik Torgeir Lognvik

      wp7 wil explode in 2012… they’re new and fresh:)

  • Lilstevie

    So long as Android doesn’t start imitating WP7 market share.

  • Anonymous

    These corporate big shots just don’t get it. We are tired of you acting like children whining that another kid stole your idea. The average consumer doesn’t care who’s copying who, who developed what first or who patented this or that. We will buy whatever works best for our needs at a price we can afford.

    • http://profiles.google.com/lognvik Torgeir Lognvik

      So if you spend your life developing something extraordinary you would be fine with your neigbour “borrowing” and making tons of money on your lifework, while you make nothing??? In a society it is important to be paid in something more than the air you breathe.

  • Anonymous

    What is flattering is that both Microsoft and apple seem to find the news to tack shots at android. Here is a little tip, y’all come off a little scared when you start doing it. But hey I bet the folks over at Google are flattered that you take the time to actually talk shit.

  • Pr0m3x

    Umm isnt “people” one of htc programs
    Ive seen all of the mytouch series phone have “people” integrated in them and those device werent running ice cream at the time so i dont see why windows says the andriod copyed it from the

    • http://profiles.google.com/lognvik Torgeir Lognvik

      bcoz People never had anything like what wp7 has… I’ve used sense since it started and you must know nothing about wp7 if you claim they’re alike. Sense is an app-collection.

  • Chris Hunigan

    It was Michael Dell and now Andy Lees. When do the big wigs know when to stop talking about an operating system that has now become dominate within the smartphone industry. They are jealous of the success of Android Manufacturers. Windows will have more success within the tablet market rather than the smartphone market. You will see within the next two years that Windows OS for smartphones will be phased out. 
    Cree

    • Grammarian Strikes Again

      become dominate?  Or become *dominant*?  Words matter.  You probably also can’t tell the difference between loose and lose.

  • Anonymous

    LOL @ *Microsoft* complaining about copycats.  That’s comedy gold.

  • Anonymous

    Yeah because mango has been out for so long that Google hurried up and put these features into Ice Cream Sandwich.  I would like to know where he got that idea that make an app for android means you have to hack up the operating system to make it work.  Something tells me that he has never programmed an app for android so he should just shut up and own up to the fact that Google is destroying Microsoft in the mobile game.

    • Mark Francis

      What he is talking about, has nothing to do with Mango.

  • Anonymous

    good artist copy, great artist steels 

  • RockyR

    Here’s one feature that Microsoft’s Andy Lees, no matter how hard he tried, has been unable to copy:  Hair.

  • Latent_flux

    I seem to remember the stock software on my HTC Incredible having this feature on android 2.1…

    • http://profiles.google.com/lognvik Torgeir Lognvik

      Your memory must be bad then or you probably don’t know how it’s done in wp7:)

  • Zsolt or

    You see, it’s MS copying Apple with the bashing of android.
    It fun today to say that android copied everything. Sad, that no one really have enough intellectual honesty to admit, that the whole thecworld is based on implementing, modifying perfectioning old ideas…
    Show me something what Apple or MS invented.

  • http://twitter.com/redigits Steve

    Lawl.

    Microsoft: “FIRST!!!!!”
    Microsoft: “yeah we did it too bro”
    Microsoft: “we are SO much better than you”
    Microsoft: “we could have done that and done it better… but we didn’t”
    Microsoft “cool features bro. Ours are better”

    Microsoft appears pretty arrogant in the press. But here’s the thing: Microsoft talks the talk, but they can’t walk the walk.

  • jay attah

    Has his bloody mango even been pushed out? All i keep heaing is next week next week..

    • Mark Francis

      I had Mango the day after its release date and so did my wife. You must be listening to the wrong people.

  • Jayhammy

    SUch BS. THis is more of a take on HTC’s “People” app than anything from MicroCrap. It takes months and years to develop a platform with features like this. HTC’s People was out long before the latest Windoze phones. 

    • http://profiles.google.com/lognvik Torgeir Lognvik

      You like many of your android friends have no idea what wp7 has done… check it out before you comment…

  • Anonymous

    where are all the articles about the regular ios ‘copycat’ features.  Every upgrade

  • http://twitter.com/DGEck Dan Eckert

    If Goolge “copied” the idea from WP7 for ICS then why has my EVO (running 2.3.3) been showing my contacts Facebook and Twitter posts in their contact and when they call?  HTC Sense has had this for years…I guess MS just needs to fell relevant in the mobile OS world.  Also pretty sure my Palm Pre did the same thing in 2009 so I gues Palm copied it from MS too even thought WP7 was not even on the market yet.  I do like how MS just keeps confirming what we already knew…you have to be smart to use Android…if you need a dumbed down OS and someone to tell you how you should use your phone you go with iOS and WP7…heaven forbid someone need to think when using a phone!

    • http://www.inrim.net YeshaiB

      HTC had this back in the day on WM 6.5 :)

      • http://profiles.google.com/lognvik Torgeir Lognvik

        No they did not… You don’t understand what ms has done:)

  • http://twitter.com/granadzo Zoram Granados

    Two things Android/Google does really well that I wish other phones could do.
    Maps/Turn by Turn (FREE)
    Contacts Pop Up

    That being said, everything that I use to do on my Droid I can do much better, faster, and easier on my 4S, everything works, loads quickly, and is incredibly smooth.

    • http://profiles.google.com/lognvik Torgeir Lognvik

      as long as you open 1 app at a time!!!:)

  • Anonymous

    “the more functionality you add, the more complicated and difficult to use the phone becomes”
    In that case, let’s just remove as many functions as possible thus making it super easy to use! WP7 fans, you are a spunky bunch but THAT is why you should chuck your phones out the *window*. The philosophy of the WP team is all wrong

    • http://profiles.google.com/lognvik Torgeir Lognvik

      I beg the differ! I have used most winmo’s 6.0, 6.1 and 6.5… I’ve also used android 1.6, 2.1, 2.2 and 2.3. My wife has iphone 3gs, iphone 4 and ipad…
      wp7 has the right philosophy for me, so I’ll chuck away my android-phones:)

  • http://twitter.com/casandrasdream casandrasdream

    Microsoft thinks it can buy me, they think they can sue me, they try to impose on me their products. But I just want to throw up on MS

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