Office For iPad Beats The Hell Out Of Rooming With Paul Thurrott

This is not really a review of Office for iPad. It’s more of a review of Paul Thurrott’s review of Office for iPad. Thurrott has some interesting observations that I think are well worth addressing. So let’s get to it.

Nicely Done

It’s clear from Thurrott’s review — and all the other reviews I’ve read — that Microsoft did a superb job with Office For iPad. Among the highlights:

  1. Performance is excellent;
  2. Takes advantage of the iPad’s features;
  3. Fidelity with Microsoft’s Office for Windows; and
  4. Available for downloading and purchase on the date of announcement.

Everything about Office for iPad is impressive, but, in my opinion, Office’s killer feature is its ability to retain formatting between the iPad and the PC. For those who must use Office on their iPad, this is surely like giving ice water to someone in hell.

Thurrott’s Cheap Shots

[pullquote]Thurrott’s brain is a wonderful organ. It starts working the moment he gets up in the morning and does not stop until he starts to write about Apple[/pullquote]

If only Thurrott had stopped at talking about Office For iPad. But Thurrott, being Thurrott, couldn’t help himself from tossing a couple of gratuitous cheap shots at Apple’s iPad.

“Office for iPad looks awesome. Deal with it.” ~ Paul Thurrott (@thurrott)

Thurrott is a troll, plain and simple. Reading Thurrott’s take on Apple is like accidentally stepping into the shower when it’s still icy cold — it’s painful and you swear you’ll never do it again.

But who knows, by being such a troll, Thurrott almost certainly gets more page views and his writing is certainly more popular and more prosperous than mine will ever be.

I cried all the way to the bank. ~ Liberace

Having said all that, I’m not writing this article in order to criticize Thurrott’s trolling. Rather, I think Thurrott’s comments on Office for iPad can be used as a proxy for other die-hard Microsoft and PC fans, and those comments are worth closer examination.

Antiquated Operating System

[pullquote]Some people get lost in thought because it’s such unfamiliar territory. ~ G. Behn[/pullquote]

“(T)he only thing holding (Office for iPad) back, really, is Apple’s antiquated mobile OS.

iOS 7, while an improvement over previous versions, still lacks basic productivity features like the ability to run at least two apps side-by-side.

You can only do—or at least see—one thing at a time.”

Saying the iPad’s operating system is antiquated because it lacks the ability to run two apps side-by-side is like the unpopular red-headed cheerleader claiming the Prom Queen is ugly because she doesn’t have red hair.

If Thurrott wants to pretend the iPad’s OS is antiquated, he’s welcome to whatever solace he can derive from that. Apple’s iPad OS will simply have to settle for glamor, fame and success.

Real Work

Hey Microsoft, with today’s announcement can we now say the iPad is useful for Real Work™? ~ Tom Reestman (@treestman)

Wonder if finally the “you can’t do real work on an iPad” thing is dead. ~ Adi Kingsley-Hughes (@the_pc_doc)

No such luck. Here’s Thurrott’s take:

“(iPad owners with Office for iPad) are going to be able to get work done.”

Thurrott is, of course, implying iPad owners haven’t been able to do any work on their iPads for the past four years.

[pullquote]He speaks nothing but madman. ~ William Shakespeare[/pullquote]

“Many are already using iPad at work. This will make the iPad truly useful for this work for the first time.”

Un-be-fricking-be-lievable. In Paul’s world, all of the millions upon millions of poor iPad users have been unable to make their iPad “truly useful” for the past four years. I guess all of those employers who purchased iPads for their employees only did so in ancipation of the day when Office For iPad would become available. Sheez.

I think Microsoft has finally realized what many Microsoft fans still have not — claiming only Microsoft products do real work makes you sound quaint — if not delusional.

Second-Class Citizen

“(B)ased on a few days of experience, I can say that (Office for iPad is) pretty complete given the form factor and the limitations of this kind of device.

So it’s important to understand the biggest limitation of Office on this platform isn’t Office, it’s the iPad.”

Journalists, like generals, are always refighting the last war. ~ Benedict Evans (@BenedictEvans)

[pullquote]Thurrott stopped to think — and forgot to start again.[/pullquote]

Wow. Despite writing about technology for a living, Thurrott just does not get it. The tablet is not “limiting.” A tablet makes for a poor PC in the same way a car makes for a poor airplane. You can’t do “real” flying with a car and you can’t travel overseas but, then again, a plane isn’t as good as a car for taxiing, either.

Tablets are not second class citizens of the PC world. They’re first class at the tasks they do – even if those tasks aren’t the same as the ones that a PC is designed to do.

Successful?

“And while some will poo-poo the possibility that iPad users will flock to these apps, I suspect they’ll be quite successful.”

Well, whether Office For iPad is successful or not probably depends upon one’s definition of success. Office For iPad is undoubtably already a success for pre-existing Office users. But what about the rest of the computing world?

Google Apps and iWorks are free. There are 100,000 apps on the iPad that do some of the functions of Office. Software has been commoditized.

Prediction: Office for iPad won’t move the needle for either Apple or Microsoft. Mobile SW pricing will prevent it from being big money. ~ Carl Howe (@cdhowe)

Been using iWork for 4 years on iOS at a cost of £21. Office over the same period will cost me £320. Not sure it’s 15x better than iWork. ~ Fraser Speirs (@fraserspeirs)

Office for iPad a boon for compatibility with business, but costs $100 a year forever. ~ Ihnatko

More importantly, the vast majority of people who own PCs don’t need Office and almost no one who owns a tablet needs Office.

My dependence on Microsoft products has come down to nil virtually. So can’t get myself to be excited about Office for iPad. ~ bhatnaturally  (@bhatnaturally)

Can’t wait to continue not using Office on my iPad. ~ MG Siegler (@parislemon)

Take a look at this opinion from Techpinions contributor, Brian Hall:

The worst I’ve heard about Office for iPad amongst hardcore Apple faithful is they don’t need it. ~ Brian S Hall (@BrianSHall)

Well Brian, that’s a pretty damning “worst thing.” My take is Office For iPad is going to attract almost no one who hasn’t already been using Office on their desktop already.

Conclusion

It’s important to reiterate that these are Thurrott’s opinions, not Microsoft’s. I think Microsoft may have finally started to figure things out — even if their fans have not.

Delivering Office for iPad is certainly a big change for Microsoft, a step away from its old Windows-first ideology. But it’s merely a piece of the puzzle that needs that big picture to become a success. ~ Simon Bisson

That sounds about right. It’s too soon to say how Office For iPad will or will not do. But it’s definitely a step in the right direction. Which reminds me of an anecdote.

Blonde Bombshell

Yogi Berra was once asked whether Joe DiMaggio’s planned marriage to Marilyn Monroe would be good for baseball. Yogi answered — as only Yogi could:

I don’t know if it’s good for baseball, but it sure beats the hell out of rooming with Phil Rizzuto. ~ Yogi Berra

Similarly, I can’t state for certain whether or not Office For iPad will be good for computing, but it sure beats the hell out of what Microsoft was doing before.

Published by

John Kirk

John R. Kirk is a recovering attorney. He has also worked as a financial advisor and a business coach. His love affair with computing started with his purchase of the original Mac in 1985. His primary interest is the field of personal computing (which includes phones, tablets, notebooks and desktops) and his primary focus is on long-term business strategies: What makes a company unique; How do those unique qualities aid or inhibit the success of the company; and why don’t (or can’t) other companies adopt the successful attributes of their competitors?

61 thoughts on “Office For iPad Beats The Hell Out Of Rooming With Paul Thurrott”

  1. “You can only do—or at least see—one thing at a time.”

    To me this is a feature worth about as much as a 16×9 ration display everyone says Apple failed when they didn’t offer. Every time I heard someone claim either is “necessary” I would ask what they would use this for. No one I asked could rarely answer with anything, much less with anything _they_ needed it for.

    Joe

    1. I personally like Apple’s implementation of multitasking, the fast switching goo in iOS 7, it’s easy and quick. I can imagine Apple making this more powerful, but they have to also keep it simple, that’s the beauty of the iPad. I also expect some sort of improved file management solution in iOS fairly soon, maybe in 8 or 9? But again, Apple has to keep things simple. There’s a reason my 80 year old father can use his iPad Air fairly well and the iMac is mostly frustrating for him.

    2. My one complaint is that when I’m using a hardware keyboard, why doesn’t command-tab move between apps? I’ve made myself switch to using the keyboard Home button (double click) but I can’t figure out why Apple wouldn’t make command-tab work as expected.

  2. Ha. Good of you to take the burden off the Macalope … global warming is tough on him … unless … [counting up the frequency of pronouns to prepositions] … Nah.

  3. I don’t know about the other Office apps, but Word for iPad is nothing to “Get Work Done” – you can’t even export a PDF (you can with Pages on the iPad). No “Open in…” (you have this with Pages on the iPad – even as a Word file). Oh, no printing with Word for iPad too, sorry (yeah, you get it, I guess ;)). Did I mention that Word for iPad only knows about Office Fonts and those pre-installed in iOS – no fonts installed with configuration profiles (as they can be installed with AnyFont)? No Corporate Fonts for you, sorry. Nice that Word for iPad keeps the layout (if one ignores the lack of automatic hyphenation on iOS – oh, and this changes the layout) …

    So, you need a PC to get your work *done*. If you’re completely entrenched in MS Office and if you are forced to use it, then Office for iPad is fine. Other than that? No need, iWork works perfectly fine (with comparatively few limitations). I get the impression that no one of the reviewers really *use* their iPads or iWork, but do everything on a PC or Mac – with MS Office …

    It is not the iPad (or iOS) that is limitting what I can do. It is Office for iPad (and other apps too).

    1. Thanks for letting us know about some of the limitations of Office for iPad. Great points about the fonts, printing and formatting issues. The thing is that I do hope that these are just version 1.0 issues and not things that will stick around for long as users are paying for an Office 365 subscription to use the full features of Office for iPad so there is an incentive for Microsoft to continue to develop for it or some users will stop paying for Office 365 subscriptions.

      1. Personally I don’t consider not printing from an iPad an issue. It is the point. I print out easily 90% less than I used to precisely because of the iPad.

        1. I agree. The iPad and iPhone have replaced paper for me and many others. But the point still remains that there are people who need a printout as a backup just in case something does go wrong. Having used computers for long enough I can see where they are coming from. Apple does a great job with AirPrint and the industry has adopted it as the 1st driverless printing standard so it is puzzling to me that as a core service it would not be included in version 1.0 of Office for iPad. But with all things there are always ways to work around these limitations for now.

  4. Not making excuses for Paul, but it’s been tough for him lately. He’s written books about Windows Phone, which I’m guessing, have sold about as well as the phone has. He has covered Microsoft for a long time, and has seen first hand how Microsoft has lost its once dominate position in the IT industry.

    At times, he has been critical of Microsoft, and astutely so. But, in that time he has grown to hate both Apple and Google. I think it detracts from his coverage of Microsoft. He will go out of his way to bash or dig at the competition. Your article points that out nicely.

    1. Microsoft and its fans have been poorly served by sycophants like Thurrott, who have cheered it, right or wrong, and cheered up its fans, almost to extinction. Where he criticizes Microsoft, it’s only to say he told them so. The key to T. is that he is always right, not matter what garbage he comes up with.

      1. MS has scores of millions of users, but very few fans. It’s not part of the value proposition. Even I, full of Apple contempt, am not a fan of MS.

        1. Exactly. Gaining fans should never be part of the value proposition. I think that is perhaps what Samsung, MS and others completely misunderstand. This can be detected in their ads and in things like MS’ pursuit of the consumer market.

          You’re absolutely right. Fans come along as a result of the value proposition.

  5. I have downloaded office for iPad since I have the office subscription here in my PC. I think I have used it like twice and that is it. I mot saying it is bad at all, it is quite good but Pages does the job for me and it does it very well. I have never needed to work exclusively on Office at all. I write all I need in Pages. Why would I honestly need office for on my iPad?

    I don’t understand why die-hard Microsoft fans are so unhappy about the iPad success? If it sells in droves it is because there is something good about it, right? It seems every time they can they try to hit Apple even with nonsense words and ideas.

    I LOVE my iPad Air and it is good to see Microsoft reconnecting to reality I don’t hate MS I just truly think Apple does great products.

  6. This fits in nicely with some of the common themes that have been spoken about Microsoft’s new CEO. Some commentators have compared this moment to the one where Jobs embraced Microsoft and declared that war with MS to be over. Many people seem to think that the new Microsoft CEO has finally declared the war on Apple to be over and they can get on with just focusing on building good products (I don’t know how he feels about the Google front though).

    Thurott will be like that Japanese soldier that got lost on an island somewhere and continued to think that the war was still going on like 30 years after WWII actually ended.

    1. Great point about the history of Microsoft and Apple and how it relates to the news of the day. The sooner some of these tech companies realize that for one to win the other has to loose the better off we all will be. From my perspective there are quite complementary in many areas and where they complement they should work together. I am sure that there where people inside of Microsoft that where upset when Apple released iWork for iOS but Apple really had to because I am sure that Microsoft was not ready with a touch 1st version of Office. Plus Microsoft was being arrogant and thought they where above the rest of the iOS developer community and did not need to share the 30% of their revenue with Apple to be on iOS devices.

      The good news is that those issues have finally been resolved and we all can move forward. Plus I am sure that for Microsoft this will mean more money for them and that should make their shareholders happy too.

      1. Office and iWork are quite different in scope and can co-exist, much the way ClarisWorks and Microsoft Office did for many years. I also am glad to see that the old guard at MS seems to have lost control of the company, they will be a much better company for it.

        About MS paying 30%? I don’t even know why they fought this so hard. Almost no one is going to pay for the subscription through the iPad Apps. Most people who are going to use Office on iPad already will have a subscription through their business or organization. This product is there to please their customers, it won’t bring in many new customers.

        1. “About MS paying 30%? I don’t even know why they fought this so hard.” – Rene Stein

          I think that every Microsoft dollar that went to Apple would have been like a knife cut to Steve Ballmer.

          1. Oh, I don’t know about that. If it wasn’t for the App Store being mandatory on the device, MS wouldn’t need it at all. MS specifically is but one software developer that derives no retail value from the App Store. They have their own awareness, their own servers and their own channel of distribution and their own App Store.

            In such circumstances, the 30% amounts to extortion. Forcing you to buy and use services you don’t need (even if you have your own). That’s why they made it free.

          2. A 30% mark-up for retail is actually quite small compared to other retail businesses, except the computer hardware business.. That’s why brand-only retail stores can be successful. And Office is not free on iPad, the viewers are basically free, but in order to create and edit, you need to have Office 365, which is $100 a year.

          3. Oh, I agree. My point is, however, MS didn’t need to pay Apple at all if they could simply use their own store resources. Having the singular App Store on iOS prompted the 30% issue. It’s like Sears having to sell through Walmart.

          4. Or like MS selling through Best Buy or Amazon or even the Apple Stores… oh wait.

            Joe

          5. For PC software, that’s true. Open marketplace. Nothing new here.
            iOS = App Store Only
            WinRT = Windows Store Only

          6. Sort of. But if you want to sell your software to people who buy their software from Best Buy, you pay Best Buy their cut. If you want to sell your software to people who buy their software through the App Store or Windows Store, you pay their cut. How it ever was and still is.

            Joe

          7. Of course. That also includes whether to sell through any particular vendor at all. Multiple retailers also create competition. No recourse on iOS or WinRT.

        2. I agree that at least in the sort term most of the people using Office on iPad are going to be existing Office 365 users and not new users. One of the other reasons I can see for them delaying Office for iPad was that when the iPad 1st launched they did not have Office 365 setup and when Apple released iWork for iOS they set the price for an office suite at $30. That price was too low for Microsoft to deal with as they have become used to selling Office for $130 and up.

          So it did take two events happening to make Office for iPad to become a real product. 1st, was the 365 subscription. 2nd was the new CEO who was able to take a fresh look at things and not have the emotional baggage and is more of an adult than Steve Blamer has been. I doubt you will hear about Satya Nadella throwing chairs around the office.

          At the end of the day it is about pleasing the end users who are the actual customers. The sooner that these companies get that the sooner they will be on the right track where they can actually compete with Apple.

  7. Microsoft should have made the Office for iPad as soon as iPad was launched. It could have made money riding on the purchase of iPads itself. Then it could have focused on making its own tablet. They tried to do too many things at once – reconfiguring the entire OS for mobile and PC and at the same time changing the whole interface that no one was accustomed to. Incremental change is the way to stay in the market. It is like the rising gas price. No one notices it. And Microsoft must learn not to mess with what already works. There is no need to improve something that does not need it. Windows 7 was working great. Their tablet could have had a different OS, may be with tiles and they should have focused on compatibility between the Mobile OS and PC OS.

    They spent time ridiculing Apple for introducing the iPad and then realized that it has really caught on. They believed everyone was very loyal and happy with the PC. They did not realize that most people were waiting to jump ship at the slightest opportunity. iPad made that happen. Now they are busy undoing every mistake they have made since the introduction of Windows 8. Now they realize that they made money not needing to do much. And all of a sudden they have had to do too much and they have never done that. It is a big mistake on their part to charge annual fee for the MS office. They are going to lose more customers that way. Let people pay one time for the software and be done with it.

    MS also has to realize that the alternatives out there are literally free or costs a tenth of their Office product. People have already become used to those alternatives and it is not possible to convince them to start using Office for iPad with a costly annual premium. They still cannot differentiate between a consumer and a corporate customer. Everyone appears like an OEM to them. Unless they are very lucky like they have been until recently, they are looking at the path down to the bottom.

    1. I agree 100% with what you have said above and wanted to add some points:

      For the Microsoft shareholders they have let them down because of the lost revenue that they could have been making selling Office to iPhone and iPad users. At least now they have corrected that mistake.

      In regards to changing the standard Windows desktop interface in Windows 8. That just shows their arrogance and lack of understanding of what the actual end users of their products want. They tried the same thing years ago on mobile with Windows CE as they thought (wrongly) that people wanted a start menu on their mobile devices. They did not. Now they went the other way and thought that desktop users wanted to get rid of the start menu and use touch as a replacement. They where wrong again. What they should have learned by seeing the success of both iOS and OS X is that you need different interfaces that are designed for different use cases.

      But I can see why tried the metro UI on the desktop and that is because to Microsoft who has gone from DOS (Command Line Interface aka CLI) to Windows (Graphical User Interface aka GUI) they thought that Metro (Touch User Interface aka TUI) was just another layer that they could layer on top of Windows the same way they did with Windows on DOS back in the 1990’s. But they where wrong. They listened to too many of the no nothing analysts that where predicting that Apple would merge OS X and iOS any day now.

      It is good to hear that Microsoft is going to be fixing future versions of desktop Windows to bring back the start menu. Many people do not like change and learning new things unless there is a good reason for doing so. Apple has shown with the iPhone and iPad that there is a good reason to learn new ways to do things.

  8. The reason Office for iPad is important is that for some of my clients they need 100% Office compatibility. But it does bring up some issues on how to get Office documents on and off the iPad to their PC or Mac systems. As described on the YML group by Lauren. But as long as those issues can be resolved then I can see it working out well for when they are on the road and are not looking to have a full laptop with them. The reason it is also important for people is that Microsoft Office does come along with their own fonts and if you are using the Microsoft Office installed fonts and you open up a document that used those fonts you do not want to have formatting issues. I do agree that it will mostly be corporate that will get this 1st in a big way as they have really purchased iPads in a big way for their workforce. So it will be interesting to see how this impacts Microsoft Surface (2 and Pro 2) sales and marketing. At least now the anti-Apple, anti-iPad crowd can stop saying that the iPad is not for “real work”.

    As for why some of my clients already have Office 365 and now can use this software. One reason is access to install media. For some of them, it is just easier to download Office than worry about where the DVD is stored. The other is license codes. They seem to misplace their license codes all the time. So having a subscription to Office 365 solves both of those issues. Plus it does let them use it on more than one system and many of my clients have more than one computer so it ends up being a good deal for them for now.

    Also, by adding in Office for iPad Microsoft has added value to the Office 365 subscription so I can see them selling more subscriptions to some people who where on the fence about signing up as they had 2 or 3 PC’s/Mac’s plus iPhones and iPads. A family or a small business could get one subscription and use that for all of their devices.

  9. It seems to me that Microsoft is attempting another round of “embrace, extend, extinguish.” The Office for iPad products, at least so far, don’t enthusiastically target iOS. Microsoft’s UI seems intended to make Windows 8 and their ribbon bar look more normal. You can’t “purchase” the app on the app store, though at least you can buy the Office 365 subscription. It doesn’t integrate with iCloud or AirPrint. They aren’t trying to make the bar-none, this is the best conceivable productivity suite for iPad office.

    I suspect that when the Surface/Windows 8 touch version is released, they’ll use this as a means of doing direct comparisons….it’s like your iPad, except you can print and use all these other features we purposely held back because an iPad “isn’t a real PC.”

    I bought a license, but I’m not convinced.

    1. Great points about lack of iCloud and AirPrint features. I do hope that Microsoft does not try and use those lack of features for marketing reasons. If they do, I only can see it backfiring on them. The lack of iCloud sync I think has more to do with the fact that they want to push their One Drive cloud solution over the others. However, they should still have included it as an option. I am sure that there would also be users on Box and DropBox that would love to have their services integrated too.

      As for not having AirPrint there day one I do not get. It is part of the core service in iOS so that makes it look like they where just being lazy.

      Hopefully some of these limitations will be addressed in future upgrades as users who have paid in to the Office 365 subscriptions are paying in to future development and software enhancements.

  10. My goodness, that review by Thurrott was was incredibly flattering to both to Office for IPad and to the iPad itself. Just from memory he praised the iPad as a great machine, He even edited his 576 page book on Windows 8.1 on it as a test. To call him a troll is absurd as he is at least as critical of MS as anyone where criticism is warranted. And there are limitations of course to an iPad for work.My son who is not a recovering lawyer, is a rising one and of course uses Office as almost everyone in his firm does. He is delighted that he can now have full fidelity of his documents on his iPad. The market for this is not those that think the iWorks is just fine for what they do, it is those people who are heavily invested in Office who want the convenience of being able to create and edit in their familiar programs. It is those people who own Office and want it on their iPad. For MS, the key is that to get it, instead of buying outright your version of Office, you have to enter into a subscription. But if you have multiple Macs and PCs, you can put the full version on 5 devices for $99 and get iPad for Office for free. It is not like you are paying for $99 just for the iPad version. MS has already stated that the printing limitation will be taken care of if indeed some perceive it as a limitation.

    1. Did you not read John’s article? Please…

      “He is delighted that he can now have full fidelity of his documents on his iPad.” Is your son not a total neophyte? Printing issues have been identified by all, and support for macros (VB) is nil, outside of the Windows ecosystem. You’re right that this is a product for Office users, and not the rest of us, which is suddenly a large portion of the market. A market that Microsoft has lost.

      Microsoft is trying to gain a foothold in mobile. This is their latest attempt.

      1. I did read this article-did you read Thurrott’s? Paul was being very objective in his assessment. “Thurrott is a troll, plain and simple.” is simply bogus and that statement alone is enough to bring into question any of objectivity and journalistic integrity of the author of that statement. He is critical of MS more than he praises it. I am not sure where you get the figures that a large portion of the business and enterprise market are not Office users. And that is exactly who the target market is of this release. Not sure what you mean about being a “total neophyte” but there is really no other option to render a complex word document other than office. You obviously have an emotional animosity against MS.

        1. I think the troll issue was clearly laid out. It is the attitude that mobile life, and *real* work, can go on now that Office has arrived… If not for the limitations of the iPad.

          This perhaps bears a striking similarity to another attitude: “well, the notion of multiple cross-platform browsers and ‘open’ standards is all very nice, but you really need to properly render our plugins and corruption of JavaScript in order to use the *real* Internet.”

          This conveniently ignores how the internet, life, work and mobile has quietly gone on very well without MS, thank you very much.

          1. I found nothing trollish about the statement. What? The tablet form factor, and iPad in particular don’t involve compromises and limitations? Would we run a huge spreadsheet with macros and graphs on an ARM (when accustomed to Intel/if we could) and like it? Is Photoshop the same performance as on a PC? These are not digs, just facts. Tablets offer a different experience, and that’s okay.

            As far as having bastardized the “real” internet, I agree, MS deserves huge contempt. But that IS the real internet, bastardized. Any one dominant company would bastardize it. Isn’t promoting Webkit exclusively on iOS not bastardizing? Does it prevent the development of other open web standards?

          2. “Isn’t promoting Webkit exclusively on iOS not bastardizing? Does it prevent the development of other open web standards?”

            No more than any other type of standards body — is GSM not preventing the development of “other open” telecom standards? I suppose so. Doesn’t change the fact that Webkit is the most compliant, best engine for the Open Standards we DO have. And if the standards were different, then I daresay it would still be the best because it would be made to comply with those, too.

          3. Sure, that was an example. If a country or group of countries gets behind a standard, be it GSM, CDMA, PAL, NTSC, 240v, whatever, then the device maker complies with it the best he can and makes the best product he can.

            WebKit is complying with the standards as they are set. Not sure how that stifles “other standards”.

          4. This is not an advocacy, but you can’t launch IE on iOS now, can you. What about a “good” IE. It’s the principle of the matter.

          5. No idea. I understand that iPad use in Enterprise is growing and that many enterprise apps are available for iPad nevertheless, regardless of whether IE is available or not…

            So, score one for choice after 20 years! After all, it’s the principle of the thing.

          6. That’s not choice, it’s just coincidental that you prefer the permitted fruit, and hate the forbidden one. 🙂

            Any anyway, in the enterprise, they own the work, so they get to say what gets used. On our own hardware, we individually own the work, and we individually should say what gets used.

          7. You’re right. I would hate to own a Windows Phone and not be able to install iOS apps. Which is why I don’t own one and I am happy for the choice of a non-Windows alternative.

          8. You know what I would hate worse? Not being able to load any compatible program I want, or have the option of alternate stores on any device.

        2. I read most of Paul’s work, follow him on Twitter, and watch Windows Weekly on twit tv. I’ve had Paul figured out for some time now. I appreciate his coverage of Microsoft, but he has become increasingly snarky when it come to the competition.

  11. Thurott is as much of a troll as John Kirk is balanced, fair and unbiased. That is to say, not at all.

  12. I’m surprised, John, that you haven’t even mentioned the most important question: the free, uneditable, version of Office for iPad may have been downloaded 12 million times but how many actual paid subscriptions has it sold?

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