marketplaces, the company says.
Windows Mobile 6.5
(Click image for further information) |
In February, Microsoft announced that Windows Marketplace for Mobile, formerly code-named
Skymarket, will ship on every
Windows Mobile 6.5 device when the operating system upgrade
ships on new phones later this year. The online store "will provide direct-to-phone mobile applications that can be controlled from both the phone and the Web," the company says.
Microsoft's Windows Marketplace for Mobile
(Click image to enlarge) |
Now accepting developer registrations, the online marketplace (pictured at right) promises to let developers submit up to five apps a year for $99, and to keep 70 percent of the sales revenue from any applications they sell on Windows Marketplace for Mobile. In addition, says Microsoft, Windows Marketplace for Mobile offers developers "transparency throughout the certification process," along with "guidance and support from the stage of development to the final sale to the consumer."
Microsoft's reference to "transparency" is apparently meant to differentiate its planned approval process for apps from the one already offered by Apple for its iPhone. According to widespread reports, Apple can take months to approve an application for the App Store, provides little or no feedback during the process, and often summarily rejects apps that it feels compete with its own offerings. (As a result, a shadow ecosystem has arisen, serving up non-approved applications to "jailbroken" iPhones via tools such as programmer Jay Freeman's
Cydia installer.)
Separately, Apple has also run into difficulties when apps include controversial content. For example, the company recently offered, then quickly removed, a "baby shaker" application that encouraged users to quiet a "crying baby" by shaking their phones. As documented in a post yesterday by
Engadget, Apple has also recently drawn fire from singer-songwriter Trent Reznor for rejecting an iPhone app that "may have a song with a bad word somewhere in it."
Banned applications ... No doubt, Microsoft will face content-related hurdles in the future. The company's newly released guidelines for developers, however, appear primarily intended to prevent competition from alternative online stores, and to keep Microsoft's carrier partners happy.
For example, the first three prohibitions on a list released by the company ban applications from linking to, or otherwise promoting, alternate marketplaces. In particular, developers must offer any and all upgrades to their applications through Windows Marketplace for Mobile, not directly via their websites or online updaters.
To keep carriers happy, Microsoft is also banning applications that "sell, link to, or otherwise promote" mobile voice plans, plus any applications that enable VoIP services over a mobile operator's network. Presumably, VoIP apps that work only via WiF will be allowed, though the company did not provided any further details.
Additionally disallowed are any apps that change a phone's default web browser, search client, or media player, plus any that "replace, remove, or modify the default dialer, SMS, or MMS interface." Applications that require OTA (over the air) downloads of more than 10MB are also prohibited, says Microsoft. The company also says apps that use PIM-type data (such as appointments, contacts and tasks) must use the Microsoft Pocket Outlook object model, and synchronize properly with Outlook on the PC.
Finally, any applications that display advertising must conform to a Microsoft Advertising Creative Acceptance Policy Guide. Applications that publish a user's data or location information to any other persons must have received a clear opt-in in order to do so, and must provide the user with a means of opting out subsequently, the company adds.
While Microsoft's prohibitions appear to threaten products such as
Opera Mobile 9.5, a Windows Mobile web browser that can replace Internet Explorer Mobile and is preinstalled by HTC, Motorola, and other manufacturers, it's worth remembering a key distinction between the online marketplaces offered by Microsoft and Apple. Unless an iPhone has been jailbroken, as mentioned earlier in this story, Apple's App Store is the only way to get applications onto it. In contrast, Windows Mobile also allows users to install applications by downloading them from a vendor's website and installing them onto a phone directly.
According to Microsoft, there are already more than 20,000 applications for Windows Mobile. The openness of the operating system, which permits users to download and install applications from a wide variety of sources, has long been considered one of its greatest strengths, and Microsoft has given no sign that it will prevent Windows Mobile 6.5 users from obtaining applications wherever and however they like. Since Windows Marketplace for Mobile will reportedly support only Windows Mobile 6.5 phones, owners of Windows Mobile 5.x, 6.0, and 6.1 devices will need to use "legacy" methods for purchasing and installing apps in any case.
Further informationFor developer information about Microsoft's Windows Marketplace for Mobile, see the company's website,
here. Microsoft's one-page list of prohibited application types is available in PDF format,
here. A 32-page document about the technical parameters applications will need to comply with is also available in PDF format,
here.
Other information on Microsoft's online store can be found in articles on our sister site
eWEEK.com,
here and
here. Meanwhile, Microsoft watcher Mary-Jo Foley offers comparisons between Apple's App Store and Microsoft's Windows Marketplace for Mobile on her blog,
here.
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