Following on from yesterday's question on developers and market share, Jordan Crook's article and subsequent discussion in the comments on TechCrunch is worth looking at. Starting with the Mobile Acceleration Week, where Microsoft offer training and support to those getting started with Windows Phone development, Crook talks about the attitude of Brandon Watson (senior director of Windows Phone apps at Microsoft) and how the tag-line of "Developers, developers, developers" still runs through Redmond.

Watson said that he hears from developers that "Apple is a black box, and Google isn’t there," adding that "they won’t support you the way we do; they won’t be as open about merchandizing policies or approach you in an open and respectful way... They probably thought of [app developer support] as an ROI calculation. That’s the wrong way to think about developing a platform and the future of your developers,” said Watson. “Instead, you should use them to push and sell the platform.” That starts with understanding the wants and needs of developers, said Watson. “Developers care about two things: making money and getting noticed for their work.” By putting a little extra effort into the developers program... Microsoft has the ability to help developers do both.

It's a smart editorial (which carefully manages to never directly attribute the colourful language to Watson), and it puts a lot of pressure on the developer support team to deliver the apps in the store. But everyone has to remember that the raw number in the Marketplace is not going to guarantee a user base, there needs to be support from all the departments, from all the software and hardware partners, across the board to make Windows Phone a success.