[missing-sync-winmobile-talk] Re: missing-sync-winmobile-talk Digest, Vol 39, Issue 10

[mick angel]

> Ladies and gentlemen,
>     it has been a pleasure... however I decided I will never buy the
> missing sync. It deserves its name, it is really missing, and, should
> the very long sought for version for WMS5 come out today, I would not
> trust a company that is handling the communication with its customers
> in this deplorable way. I think I had enough patience. Bye,


I am starting to agree with the sentiment above. I'm not sure what is  
going on here with the policy to not release *any* information  
concerning possible release dates. It could be:

1) the developers and managers really have no idea when the work  
might be ready (due for example to some important information they  
are waiting on from HTC/Microsoft). This makes it difficult to manage  
the expectation but not impossible: "80% done however we are waiting  
for some critical information from an external party - we estimate  
this info will be here in two weeks after which we can give another  
estimate"

2) the managers do not want to release the information due to  
competitive reasons: "missing sync: we are 60% done, please wait",  
"pocket mac: we are 80% done, pre-order now!"

3) the developers cannot work out some critical pieces of the puzzle  
with any accuracy, any estimates going up the chain are necessarily  
vague: "we really don't know, it might be 2 weeks for this module, or  
3 months, we really can't say until we get further into the code".

4) the developers are not confident that some of the problem areas  
cannot be worked out *at all* due to limitations/changes in WM5.  
Developers: "it's not a question of when, it's a questions of *if* it  
can be done without waiting for AKU2/patch/OS update/novelty garden  
gnome/etc"

5) simply poor management/poor communication

My guess is it is a combination of the above. However there are ways  
of managing customers' expectations without giving too much away to  
your competitors. Option (5) seems to be sadly what the *perception*  
has become, quite rightly given the lack of changes to the  
boilerplate Windows Mobile 5 FAQ.  At the very least the FAQ is  
logically incorrect. It does not answer the most common questions.  
The most common question by a mile is clearly "when will it be ready".

If the FAQ *is* correct, then the release is *not* close. The  FAQ  
clearly says: "Mark/Space will make a public beta version of the  
Windows Mobile 5 update available once we're getting close". With the  
lack of a public beta it is logical to assume they are not "getting  
close".

All that said, it might appear the day after tomorrow ("tada!") and  
we'd all be very grateful however the poor communication is losing  
some precious goodwill - something which takes a long time and  
expense to build up from a group of customers.

Time to start work on the automator scripts...

Mick.