'It's no contest': Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak praises Windows phone...

DailyMail ^ | 29 Apr 2012 | Daily Mail Author

[for-q-clinton]

He may have co-founded the company that became Microsoft's largest competitor, but former Apple boss Steve Wozniak has glittering things to say about his former rival's mobile OS. Mr Wozniak, who co-founded Apple with the late Steve Jobs in 1976, has given a shocking endorsement of Windows' 7.5 Mango interface. The 61-year-old, who no longer works full-time for Apple, says of the four phones he travels with (including two iPhones), the Nokia Lumia makes him feel as though he is 'with a friend, not a tool'.

Shock endorsement: Steve Wozniak, who co-founded Apple with the late Steve Jobs in 1976, has offered praise of Windows' 7.5 Mango interface Shock endorsement: Steve Wozniak, who co-founded Apple with the late Steve Jobs in 1976, has offered praise of Windows' 7.5 Mango interface During an interview for podcast The Report, Mr Wozniak emptied his pockets to show he carries two iPhones, a Motorola DRIOD RAZR and a Nokia Lumia. Comparing the Lumia with his Android device, he said: 'It's no contest'.

Still, it seems the quality of the handset has not impressed the computer genius so much as to dissuade him from praising Microsoft's mobile technology. 'I’m kind of shocked,' he added of the Mango interface. 'Every screen is much more beautiful than the same apps on Android and iPhone,' he said. Co-founders: Apple's late Steve Jobs, left, and Steve Wozniak, right, pictured during the debut of the Apple II computer in 1977 Co-founders: Apple's late Steve Jobs, left, and Steve Wozniak, right, pictured during the debut of the Apple II computer in 1977 The praise may come as a surprise to Apple fans, to whom Mr Wozniak has become somewhat of a cult figure, often referred to as 'the other Steve'.

[Hardraade]

Yes, and Apple almost ended up a corpse. Largely thank to Jobs.

The Apple II was open, expandable, and inspired tons of innovation. Then came Lisa, which was so closed that floppies had to be sent to Apple for formatting and which had no user-reachable parts.

At that time, IBM/PC just grabbed the Apple II open architecture and has kept expanding ever since.

There’s a reason Apple succeeds. I’ll not tell you what it is :).

[Gator113]

Thanks...... funny ending. LOL

I should receive my 4s tomorrow..... then we will have the 4s and my DroidX to play with.

I am thinking of dumping the hardline soon...

[Fightin Whitey]

I’d appreciate a line from you sometime, if you think of it,
telling me how you see them stacking up against each other.

Best to you.

[Keith in Iowa]

This will last until the next iPhone comes out, and he’ll gush all over it... and media will over-report it...

[Gator113]

No problem, I would be pleased to do that but you might need to remind me.... senior moments seem to come by the 6 pack these days. ;>)

[for-q-clinton]

in case you missed this.

[Swordmaker]

". . . Mr Wozniak emptied his pockets to show he carries two iPhones, a Motorola DRIOD RAZR and a Nokia Lumia. Comparing the Lumia with his Android device, he said: 'It's no contest'.

Perhaps you missed that he was COMPARING the Windows phone with his ANDROID phone. . .

He has done made this statement many times. . . and stated that he STILL prefers his iPhones. Quote from the article, one you choose to ignore, in your eagerness to slam Apple:

"He did note, however, that the iPhones - one from AT&T, one from Verizon - remain his preferred mobile devices."

Apple Ping!

Please, No Flame Wars!
Discuss technical issues, software, and hardware.
Don't attack people!
Don't respond to the Anti-Apple Thread Trolls!
PLEASE IGNORE THEM!!!

If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me.

[for-q-clinton]

You may want to highlight this as well:

'I’m kind of shocked,' he added of the Mango interface. 'Every screen is much more beautiful than the same apps on Android and iPhone,' he said.

[TXnMA]

FYI - Reply by Woz himself to the comments on the article at http://anewdomain.net/2012/04/26/apple-founder-inventor-steve-wozniak-why-i-love-my-windows-phone-7-5-fan/:

Steve Wozniak April 27, 2012 at 12:00 am · Reply

Wrong. iPhone is my favorite phone. I did give my opinion that the Windows 7P phone had superior visual appearance and operation cues that were also more attractive. In my opinion, it sets the mark for user interface. I would recommend it over my Android phones given that it doesn’t yet have the breadth of apps. I surmise that Microsoft hired someone from Apple and put money into having a role in the UI and appearance of some key apps. I also surmised that Steve Jobs might have been reincarnated at MS due to a lot of what I see and feel with this phone making me think of a lot of great Apple things.

FWIW, I [TXnMA] hated its low resolution display and the rectangular pixels, but for the sheer fun of programming and getting spectacular results, my all-time favorite machine (of nearly 100) was my "Woz"-signature Apple //gs with the Apple Video Overlay (Chroma-key) Card -- stuffed with virtually every accessory sold by Applied Engineering -- and "TML Pascal".

[antiRepublicrat]

what they did was more or less copy work by Xerox

It was actually quite an improvement over the Xerox work, with several new concepts. There was also genius in getting a GUI to run well in a $2,500 machine instead of the $50,000+ hardware Xerox had theirs running on.

[antiRepublicrat]

Yes, and Apple almost ended up a corpse. Largely thank to Jobs.

You really don't know your Apple history. Jobs was kicked off the Lisa program and moved to head the Macintosh program, which was quite successful. He was forced out of the company in 1985, and Apple's dark ages came not long afterwards, to be resurrected after his return.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Swordmaker.

[Hardraade]

Lol. The Lisa program almost killed Apple. And of course, it didn’t matter much that Jobs was “kicked off the Lisa”, Lisa was dead as a dornail on arrival :). The save was Mac, which wasn’t Jobs innovation at all, but simply an implementation of a Xerox design. It was still too narrow, and too closed, to really compete against IBM running the old Woz-like openness.

If he supplied something to Apple, it wasn’t innovation. Rather the opposite.

[antiRepublicrat]

The save was Mac, which wasn’t Jobs innovation at all, but simply an implementation of a Xerox design.

The Lisa was the result of that (paid for) Xerox visit to see the Alto, which with its commercial variant the STAR was completely proprietary and closed. The Mac was a separate, later project that was very different from what Xerox had. Apple introduced new things you take for granted now, such as drag-and-drop file manipulation, pull-down menus, self-repainting windows, the generalized clipboard and much more. No, the Xerox products did not have these. And Apple did it in a fraction of the space and computing power of the Xerox products.

Sadly, what Apple left behind was the fact that it was a whole system tied together with its object-oriented language and environment called Smalltalk. That was awesome and highly innovative. However, there is no way it could have been squeezed into a $2,500 machine at the time of the Mac.

If he supplied something to Apple, it wasn’t innovation. Rather the opposite.

Jobs supplied general vision, stubbornness and extreme anal-retentiveness for product purity and design. These are what made Apple products stand apart in the end, and what drove crazy sales. Did you know that the expansion lines in the concrete sidewalk outside of a street-front Apple Store's glass are at an exact multiple of the width of the glass panels so that all the seams line up? That's just for something that's peripheral to the actual product, and they take so much care.

User-oriented attention to detail to the level of obsessive-compulsive disorder, that's what makes the products great.

[antiRepublicrat]

Good point on all the definitions of openness, and a person really has to pick the ones that are important to him. Apple’s not very open on the hardware, although it uses standard computer parts. However, it is intended that accessories will be attached through the USB, Firewire or Thunderbolt ports, and that ecosystem is extremely open.

So if you need to pluck and chuck graphics cards and CPUs, Apple is probably not your thing. But if you don’t mind attaching stuff, Apple should be no problem on the hardware openness.

But when it comes to open standards, Apple tends to play very nicely. It’s certified UNIX, so you have those standards. Apple’s Safari browser is one of the most standards-compliant out there.

[ReignOfError]

On my Samsung Epic 4G, I rooted it and is completely customizable. I was on stock for a while, and then moved through four everyday ROMs. Each ROM made the phone seem like a new phone.

Iphone is for people with little imagination and creativity.

Just keep telling yourself how imaginative and creative it is to flash ROMS and download skins. It's the gadget equivalent of the "Fast and the Furious" fans who add spoilers and glass-packs and comically large or small wheels and shake their heads at those poor blighted souls who just drive a car off the lot and don't spend their weekends with a wrench in their hands.

[Swordmaker]

As a tech and innovation guy, Jobs was not that shiny. And of course, when it came time for the mac platforms, what they did was more or less copy work by Xerox.

Uh, no. They visited PARC for a total of 16 hours, took no code, and were not allowed to take notes. Apple also PAID Xerox $1,000,000 in pre-IPO common stock, which Xerox later sold after the Apple IPO for $7 million... had they kept it, it would be worth BILLIONS today... for the rights to anything they saw on their visits.

The Apple Mac GUI is not by any stretch of the imagination copy of the smalltalk GUI of XEROX. You can look at comparisons of the two and the differences are quote striking. Apple made many innovations that are completely lacking in the XEROX GUI, such as overlapping windows, draggable windows that stay visible instead of just becoming outlines outlines during the move, drop down, hierarchical menus, Menu bars, Dragable icons, ACTIVE document icons that you can drag an app icon that opens the app, etc., and even the trashcan metaphor for deleting files. Even having folders and files in folders was an Apple invention.

There was FAR LESS copying than the myths promulgated around this than most people are lead to believe.

[Swordmaker]

The Apple II was open, expandable, and inspired tons of innovation. Then came Lisa, which was so closed that floppies had to be sent to Apple for formatting and which had no user-reachable parts.

It did? News to me... More Myths... so little time to shoot all of them down!

[Ted Grant]

Flashing new, superior ROMs is not like that at all.

[Locomotive Breath]

Woz wanted to just give everything away. Which would have resulted in no Apple as we know it.

Apple licensed some work from Xerox who was too stupid to know what they had. But there was a hell of a lot more to the first Mac.