Its revisionist to say that it was "never a contender", it was for a short time and lost monumentally. Had Android not existed it would not have lost so monumentally.
Windows phone sits in the minds of many as this "absolute failure that could never have worked" but the reality is that it could have worked had it not floundered so phenomenally in the wake of Android.
I guess that depends on what your threshold is for being "a contender".
All of this is a bit subjective, but if I asked 10 friends and 10 relatives whether they thought Windows Phone was a failure, I'd expect close to 10 friends to say "yes", most of the relatives to say "What is Windows Phone?", and the rest of the relatives (if there were any left) to likely say "yes".
Personally, I'd call that a failure.
Yeah, I know I haven't actually asked the questions (and probably won't), but I think I know my friends and relatives well enough to guess what they would say (mostly based on prior technical discussions).
Again, you're talking about the current state of things and not about the original cited discussion: "what if android didn't exist? would iOS dominate completely?" to-wit I responded that Microsoft might have very well stepped up to the plate, but in the reality we currently live in all OEM's were going Android; Additionally Microsoft crumbles and "pivots" under failure causing them to fail even harder in most cases.
Sorry, been busy last couple of days, and just got back to this.
Yeah, I quoted your "contender" line in my previous response, but I was seeing that as basically equivalent to what you said earlier: "is very revisionist to call it failed" -- which I interpreted to mean that it was a dishonest assessment of what actually happened.
I'm not sure how you can call something "revisionist" if you aren't actually talking about what really happened in history, so maybe that's the source of disconnnect here.
I saw your comment as not being tied to the imaginary universe, but as an aside reflecting your opinion of the value of the Windows Phone in reality.
I suspect that if Android hadn't happened, it is likely that some other entity would have produced a phone that had an equal chance of stomping out Windows Phone. Not that it really matters, because like I said, my opinion is, that in reality Windows Phone was a failure, and I was just responding thinking you were saying that wasn't a fair assessment.
Windows phone sits in the minds of many as this "absolute failure that could never have worked" but the reality is that it could have worked had it not floundered so phenomenally in the wake of Android.