Microsoft (MSFT) thinks that Facebook (FB) is imitating it but it doesn’t seem all that flattered so far. In a post on the company’s official TechNet blog, Microsoft VP of corporate communications Frank X. Shaw said that Facebook’s launch event for its new Home software “was remarkably similar to the launch event we did for Windows Phone two years ago.” Shaw’s criticisms of Facebook Home largely revolve around its supposedly novel conception as a “people-centric” overlay that places less emphasis on apps and more on your friends and family.
“When we sat down with a blank sheet of paper and designed Windows Phone, we put three words on the wall to guide the team: ‘Put People First,'” Shaw explained. “Those three words were chosen around a pretty powerful but simple insight: People are more important than apps, so phones should be designed around you and the people you care about, not the apps you might use to reach them.”
Shaw then sarcastically praised Facebook for supposedly taking Microsoft’s ideas and applying them to Android, which Shaw said was badly in need of a more human touch.
“We understand why Facebook would want to find a way to bring similar functionality to a platform that is sadly lacking it,” he said. “But as Android owners know, that platform is complicated enough without adding another skin built around another metaphor, on top of what is already a custom variant of the OS. So, while we applaud Facebook for working to give some Android owners a taste of what a ‘people-centric’ phone can be like, we’d humbly like to suggest that you get the real thing, and simply upgrade to a Windows Phone.”
