Welcome back to our weekly Windows 10 Mobile news recap series, where we go over the top stories of the past week in the world of Microsoft’s mobile operating system. Let’s get started.
Satya Nadella tells all in his book, hints at Surface Phone.
Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, recently told us quite a bit in his new book, Hit Refresh. One of the most notable parts of the book is a bit where he spoke about the acquisition of Lumia, and how it marked an uphill battle that the company couldn’t win. Satya admitted that he voted “no” to the acquisition put forth by Steve Ballmer, and felt like Microsoft was chasing Google’s coattails trying to establish its mobile foothold.
Nadella ended up giving us a glimmer of hope, though. He goes on to say that “What we needed most was a fresh and distinctive approach to mobile computing,” and “Where we went wrong was failing to recognize our great strengths were already part of the soul of our company.” These asides seem to me like they hint at Microsoft’s plans to delve into a new type of device – maybe even the long rumored Surface Phone.
HP defies rumors, will continue to sell Elite x3 until 2019
The community got all up in a tizzy this week, as rumors started flying that HP would be discontinuing the production and sale of the HP Elite x3 this coming November. As it turns out, these rumors were totally bunk. HP came out against these rumors, telling us that they plan to continue selling the HP Elite x3 until 2019 – so, there’s quite a bit more gas left in that tank. While it’s not exactly the savior of Windows Phone, the Elite x3 is a solid device, and it’s good to see it stick around.
WeChat dropping support for Windows 10 Mobile
Another week, another app dropped from Windows 10 Mobile. This week, it’s WeChat – one of the most popular messaging applications in China. Windows 10 Mobile never really touched the market in China, even compared to the rest of the world, so this isn’t really surprising. Users of the app on Windows 10 Mobile were recently greeted with a message saying that it’s no longer supported, and a request to switch over to the iOS or Android version.
280 characters on Twitter already showing up on Windows Mobile
Twitter users, rejoice! Just about everyone on Twitter has now heard that the website is switching over to 280 character tweets in regions that use more wordy languages, like English. This change is being tested with a handful of users, and will be spreading out over time as Twitter gets an idea about how they want to handle it. If you use Twitter on Windows 10 Mobile and were selected as one of the testers, you should already be able to reach that new limit.
We’ll see you next week with more Windows 10 Mobile news!
