Have the critics actually used Metro?

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With all the talk of Windows Phone since Christmas, Wayne Rash addresses a simple question on Techweek Europe... of all these people critiquing the Windows Phone handsets, which of them have used one? As he hadn't he nipped down to the local store to test drive an HTC Titan to see for himself. And yes, as you would expect, he loves the interface. But he also sums up Microsoft's biggest problem with Windows Phone.

Now, I realise that spending 20 minutes with a phone isn’t the same thing as a thorough review, but I did have the chance to see the basics of how it works. My initial impression is that the critics of the interface either haven’t tried it, or they’re so set in their ways that their belief system doesn’t allow for a user interface that’s not the icon grid that they’ve become familiar with on iPhone and Android devices.

So if the problem is not the interface, what is it? Rash thinks he knows:

And this, I think, is where Microsoft ran into trouble. The WP7 phones are hard to find, they aren’t particularly cheap and as a result a lot of people haven’t bothered to look at them, never mind buy one. This means very few people, including the critics, have any idea how they actually work.

The answer? Get as many phones to more people, and work extra hard on infrmative advertising.

Source / Credit: Wayne Rash (Techweek Europe)