Mr. Pogue: How can you say you are not comparing the Shadow to the Apple iPhone when your article’s title is: “Reaching for Apple”, Falling Short. And, the first sentence fragment is: “The iPhone’s biggest achievement isn’t any particular feature;”. Whether or not you intended it, a comparison between the Shadow and the iPhone. You and Jake both claim my blog entry is “riddled with factual errors.” However, except for my typo to add a point where it should have been (now corrected), I don’t really see either of you really correcting anything other than my initial addition error (which, again, is now corrected). You, of course, are as entitled to your opinion as much as I am entitled to mine. The difference is that a lot more people read your opinion and most of those are probably not the techie-geekie people who read my little blog. So, when you offer an opinion that does not reflect technical details at 100% accuracy, it gets propogated to a of people who don’t know any better. The little group that visits my blog seem to be techie-geekie types who are well able to challenge any mistake I might make (and I appreciate that BTW) and think through technical criticisms better than the average non-technical person. Finally, I am not defending the Shadow. I merely pointed out the factual errors in your commentary. As I said in my blog entry, I have my own criticisms of Windows Mobile and bring them up frequently here. My aim, though is the hope that these criticisms fan out through the Windows Mobile power user community who might, if they agree with a particular issue, let it be known to Microsoft that it is an issue they (Microsoft) should take seriously as a problem for end users.

The chief one is that I never even ONCE compared the Shadow to the iPhone!

Maybe the headline gave you that impression. But I don’t write the headlines. And in the article itself, there is not a single such comparison–because it would be stupid. These two machines are intended for very different audiences.

You also make a number of factual errors in your posting.

You say:

“Um, since he is directly comparing it to the Apple iPhone, let’s point out that the iPhone and iPod touch do not support Flash at all.”

Again–I never compared the Shadow to the iPhone, directly or not.

Besides, you’re missing the point of my gripe. It’s not that the Shadow doesn’t support Flash. Very few phones do.

It’s that, instead of just saying “Flash not supported,” the Shadow says: “Make sure the path and file name are correct and that all the required libraries are available.”

That’s just obnoxious user-hostile Microsoft programming.

“On most Windows Mobile devices, pressing and holding the Talk button places you in speakerphone mode. This, of course, is not intuitive.”

But this phone is not “most Windows Mobile devices”–what I wrote is correct.

“But, how often do I need to delete a photo right after taking it? ”

Are you kidding me? You must be kidding me. Why do you think every digital camera ever made offers a dedicated Delete button?

Because VERY often, you take a lousy photo. The beauty of digital is that you can delete it on the spot.

“Why is an auto-format needed while entering a phone number into Contacts? ”

Because (203) 551-2333 is a lot easier to read than 2035512333.

“phone number are formatted with parens and hypens upon completion.”

Totally, 100% wrong. They are NOT auto-formatted on the Shadow. That’s what I’m complaining about!

You don’t give a point when you agree with my My Faves point.

“Again, if we look at it from his comparison with the iPhone,then, well, the iPhone simply doesn’t have 3rd party apps”

Nobody but you is comparing the Shadow with the iPhone.

Even then, my point stands: having to page through 4 screens to get through ONE Start menu is bad design–and gets old fast.

“Press and hold the End Call key to lock a WiMo Smartphone.”

But not the Shadow. I don’t understand why you keep saying that because OTHER phones work a certain way, the Shadow therefore works the same way. It doesn’t.

If you want to defend the Shadow, maybe you should try one before you write.

“To sum up then, IMHO,NYT’s David Pogue’s criticisms are 54.5% on target”

And to sum up, I think your post is 100% off-target.

I appreciate constructive criticism, don’t get me wrong. But your analysis is way, way off-base.

–David Pogue

1. You’re criticizing Pogue largely for his personal opinions. His opinions seem fair, in most, but not all cases.

2. You inexplicably don’t actually increment the scoring to 7-3 for the “My Faves” point. It stays at 6-3. This significantly alters your statistics.

3. You again inexplicably go off on a tangent about how the iPhone doesn’t have third-party apps or as many functions as a Windows Mobile smartphone.

Pogue’s point had nothing to do with this fact. Pogue’s point was that the Start Menu navigation was too tedious and unintuitive.

So at this point, I’m seeing 7-3.

4. Under a locking feature. I agree with you that what WinMo Standard does now is fine. Be aware that Pogue is comparing the iPhone, not the iPod Touch. I’ve never used the iPod Touch, but the iPhone’s locking system stays locked. Still 7-3.

So, if I assume my corrections are correct, I see he has a score of 70%. Which is pretty damned good.

Me personally, I’m torn between the iPhone and Windows Mobile smartphone. I love everything about the iPhone except the lack of certain features/software. This will eventually be fixed 6-12 months down the line after the SDK is released.

Windows Mobile (both smartphone and especially Pocket PC Phone) are plagued with reliability issues and clunkiness, and performance issues.

I want to love it, and people make claims all the time that Win Mo is super stable and speedy, but I’ve never seen it, and I’ve owned a ton of HTC and Motorola WinMo units.