There's a fair amount of debate around Windows Phone going on over at Slashdot, after 'occassional_dabbler' asked what the problem with Windows Phone was. Swinging from the practical (lots of talk around live tiles and Metro UI) to the expected views of Microsoft from the community (the negative branding around 'Windows'), it makes for fascinating reading.

The actual question that has started the debate:

"Reviews by 'commentators' such as this one predict certain doom for both Nokia and Microsoft on the basis of the OS being a failure, yet whenever the Lumia handsets are reviewed in the mainstream press they are often highly praised. Windows phone is an immature OS, certainly, but it does pretty much everything you need in a smartphone, is getting better with each update and it is beautiful. I have a Lumia 800, and now I'm used to how it and the WP OS works I find it a painful process to go back to an Android or iPhone for some obscure app not yet supported on WP. WP gave me the same feeling I got when I bought my first iBook, fired up OS X 10.1 and realized I had just been shifted up a decade. So why so serious? What do Slashdotters who have really tried WP think of it?"

Between all the strong opinons there are a lot of lessons for people in the Windows Phone ecosystem. Here's two comments that particularly stood out:

I do think all 3 of the OSes are very good in their own right, but why WP is lagging sort of baffles me, I'd expect it to at least have some interest among youth looking for Xbox Live integration. The Lumia phones are gorgeous, but honestly on the wrong carrier....Verizon should have been the Lumia's focus. AT&T's is pretty saturated with iPhone. Microsoft shot themselves in the foot with their half-assed Kin device on Verizon. So, my basic answer is carriers, carriers, carriers, even more so than developers.

But back to windows phone, I suspect the reason I feel so differently about it compared to most Slashdotters is my needs are very different. I don't want to root it, I don't want to hack it, I don't want to tinker with it and mod it; I have plenty of other toys and gadgets I root/hack/mod (including other android devices). I just want a phone that works as advertised and doesn't get in my way. It makes calls (brilliant call quality on the Nokia hardware by the way), takes pictures, connects to all my social networks, connects to all the services I use, and allows me to download apps.

Settle down with a coffee, there's a lot to get through, but it is worth it. You can read the rest of the comments and join in the debate at Slashdot.