Windows Mobile 6.5 Becomes Official Today Microsoft Unveils Marketplace and My Phone Service

October 6 2009 will remain in history as the day when Microsoft
officially announced its Windows Mobile 6.5 mobile OS together with two
new services for its mobile customers: the Marketplace and My Phone.

Should you hurry into your favorite carrier s store and get a Windows
Mobile 6.5? We hate to be the bearers of bad news but the new OS
Microsoft is proposing isn t all that great. It s rather a transitional
solution to Windows Mobile 7, the mobile OS that Microsoft really wants
to launch.

But what about the new services available? The Windows Marketplace for
Mobile is an application storefront similar to the one found on the
iPhone which will grant you access to Windows Mobile 6.5 applications.
The My Phone service is a web-based backup and sharing service similar
to Apple s MobileMe. Should we be excited about them? Yes we should! The
two services will definitely improve your mobile experience no matter
what Windows Mobile OS version you ll be running in the future.

The Marketplace will offer you a web and on phone user interface which
should help you acquire all the apps you want. The app store offers you
two different payment methods: instant credit card purchase or monthly
phone bill bundled together with your carrier billing. The store will be
available in 29 countries starting today so you should have no problem
downloading all the extra content you want for your Windows Mobile 6.5
phone. The Marketplace offers features like a search bar, featured apps
showcase, apps categories, 24-hour refund period (1 refund available per
month), re-download support for paid apps and Windows Live ID
compatibility. So far there are about 100 applications waiting to be
downloaded, and most of them are games. That number should significantly
increase in the following months.

My Phone will let you backup and access your contacts, calendar, text
messages, photos and videos as long as you don t exceed your 200MB
allotted storage space. My Phone comes with social networking support
for Flickr, Facebook, MySpace and Windows Live. Other neat and very
useful features will be available to Premium users. You ll be able to
force the phone to ring even when on silent mode, remotely lock the
handset, locate it on the map and remotely erase its contents. The
Premium version will be available for free for 60 days. After that you
ll have to treat each Premium service presented above like an
independent paid app and order it from the Marketplace.

What are your thoughts on Microsoft s Marketplace and My Phone?