If you are not familiar with John Gruber, he’s the mind behind the popular Daring Fireball website. Gruber was a former Apple employee and the focus of his site is usually the discussion of Apple products. His “claim chowder” posts often call out fans of other platforms who incorrectly predict a not-so-great outcome for an Apple product. John Gruber had a chance to use a Windows Phone 7 device and commented on it during his podcast, The Talk Show. His impression was the Windows Phone 7 experience was “very, very favorable“. Gruber went on to say it was “really nice” and he was “really impressed“. If he had to choose today between a Windows Phone 7 device vs. an Android phone, his selection would be a Windows Phone 7 device. When it comes to design, he went on to say, “in terms of polish and quality, it’s absolutely very, very impressive.”
Why does this matter? If you have a new platform and a staunch supporter of Apple products says nice things, that says plenty about Windows Phone 7. Gruber also gets good technology, so it’s more than just some random Apple enthusiast. Credit to Gruber for judging a product on it’s merits and not the company who manufactured the OS. There are way too many fan sites who exist to bash other platforms.
Business Insider via Fromedome
I stronly feel john has sold out to MS.
MS is trying hard to buyout media and critics.
Sorry John.. if you need money please ask for donation I will be glad to donate few of my savings but selling out to MS for some cash is not what we thought you are.
This is my strong gut feeling
No way John Gruber would sell out to anyone, Apple included. No way.
Listen to the podcast. John is being quite honest is his opinion. He is an interface guy and he likes what he sees. When I first approached Android development, the one thing I noticed was that the design asthetics for Android were pretty weak. The look of the default controls, like the butt ugly radio buttons, lacked any cohesion.
That’s still a problem, especially in the Android Market.
I think this might be a major problem when the carriers and OEMs start slapping their own UIs over the top. We’ve already seen HTC try and bring Sense UI to WP7, and Samsung might be working on something similar. If Motorola gets on board, I’m sure they’ll try something hideous like MotoBLUR, all of which lose the brilliant simplicity of WP7.
You should note that the main screens (the start screen) will not be touchable by any of the carriers or manufacters. Only allowing them to add a tile of their own. So if you do not like it, you can merely remove the tile (and presumably uninstall the whole carrier/manufacter app all together). MS has put in strick guidelines that states no actual modifications to the OS itself can be done by either, and they can’t bloat it up with crapware which can’t be removed by the end-user. So in no way will you see the simplicity go out the door for WP7.