Sounds like Microsoft has serious iPhone envy. We all knew they were going to integrate the Zune into it. The Xbox features are a plus, but how about the dedication to form factor? For Microsoft to say that the form won’t change across phone manufacturers is … brave. My worst nightmare though is that they will scrap their mobile business plan. If anything create one for work and one for play. Apparently I’m not alone. Here’s an email I received from one angry developer…

Tam Hanna, Tamoggemon’s CEO said:

"When I saw the slides, one thing was clear for me: this is an iPhone clone. Windows Mobile as we know it is dead! If my XPERIA X1 would run that, I’d ditch it ASAP" Microsoft has attempted to out-iPhone the iPhone, and has thereby forgotten about the core values of its operating system. The iPhone always was mainly used for entertainment  and gaming, while the Windows Mobile boxen were admittedly boring but great at getting work done.

Different use cases require different user interfaces: various carriers have tried to sell the iPhone into businesses, and have failed. Similar things can be said about the BlackBerry Storm, which followed the same concept. The strength of Windows Mobile was platform diversity this is something which has been lost on the 7 series.

Of course, not all is bad. Dr. Doris Maria Kohrs, director of design and QA, said:

"Even though the hardware diversity was great for customers, the work of my department will get easier: less hardware variety leads to less design / testing effort, which always is a good thing."

In the end, we see Microsoft’s WM7 selling well, but at the expense of the current community. The operating system has become "one of many" entertainment-driven systems, but its unique for-business features are lost.