Windows Phone 8 is vaporware
In the US, Windows Phone 8 is a nonexistent product. It’s a thing people have spoken about on the internet but that’s about it. There’s an occasional tv ad about it as well but they don’t use carrier or specific information. The proof lies on the ground. If you think I’m wrong go try to buy a Windows Phone now. Walk into an AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile or Sprint store and leave with a phone running Windows Phone 8. It’s a fantasy. In NYC AT&T has no stock of Windows Phones. None. And for the most part it’s not because of long lines – it’s because of a lack of stock. While T-Mobile is supposed to start sales today, a few calls in the area turned up limited to no stock (assuming you even knew they released it). Verizon is rumored to have this magical device in December and Sprint…well maybe 2013.
Bottom line is that if you can’t buy a device, it doesn’t exist. No point advertising it. It’s hard to tell if the thing is even launched or not. There’s no media blitz but how can there be if you can’t actually obtain the thing?
This isn’t how you launch a hero device or a platform.
Related Posts
About The Author
The Gold Bond effect. Build up interest “before” actually releasing the product. The chatter builds desire, which builds more chatter, and so on. Depending on how it it implemented, it could have an overwhelming outcome.
Isn’t this the same strategy that they used in WP7? We know how that played out…what is it, 4% market share?
Dumb article…
Your article is purely for clicks. It is without question one of the dumbest things ive ever read in my life…apple runs out a stock is it consider vaporware?..i can go on and on and on..but the stock is temporary….. your dumb way of thinking..not so much..selling all the inventory, last time I checked was a great thing..especially when they just started selling with no real advertisement..get a life
When Apple sells out it’s because a few hundred phones were sold per store. In midtown NYC I’ve called and I know the stock. Stores got 3-4 phones total (including the display phone). None in blue or yellow. They have not received any new shipments since the weekend. I check AT&T periodically and they still show no new stock and I’ve called stores who confirmed that the site is accurate and they have no idea when stock is coming in. That’s pretty different than iPhone sales.
Are you kidding me? You are completely out of line here. Yea selling out is good, if people bought them! I walked into an att store asking for a Lumia 920 on launch day and they no idea what I was talking about. They refused to give me a early upgrade unless I got an iPhone and made me buy the phone outright! At least I didn’t have to get locked in two more years. . . Then they refused to give me My free charging plate cause its only for two year contracts. I waited 3 hours for that bullsh1t! If you were at all up to date with WP news. You sir, should get a life!
I also went to AT&T store on the launch day at 9.15am, and the store still didn’t put 920’s on launch day. They did at 10.00am. I wanted to upgrade my line and my wife’s line and found on my wife’s line they could, and I asked for red one the first rep said they have red in stock and then he went inside asked the manager, and he said that they didn’t have any in stock except for one to put on display. Finally at 11.00am they put on display. I also pre-ordered online and got the red one for my wife on Nov. 10th. But the stores are showing knee-jerk reactions in many cases. I noticed they are encouraging people to go for Note II instead of Lumia 920, if customer is not asking for iPhone. Screw AT&T, so much for being premier carier. They need big fuck and probably management should take it serious or just come out of premier carrier branding.
What’s dumb about this article? If you search on ATT.com near your zipcode, most stores show most colors as out of stock. It would have been a good thing if they had in stock and got sold out. But in this Lumia 920 case, the fact is most stores never received Red, Cyan, Yellow in stock. So, it says Out of Stock. That’s a bad status. Some stores received literally 1 or 5 Red & Cyan Lumias. No stores ever received Yellow Lumias. All stores received 10 to 15 White & Black Lumias. And many stores still have White & Black Lumias in stock. That means even these 10 to 15 of them are not completely sold. I am tracking this pretty closely, believe me. If you want you can go and check in few of your nearby ATT stores
I totally agree with the article. I’ve gone to 2 ATT corporate stores to check out the 920 and 8x side by side. The neither one had the 8x. Couldn’t tell me when they were getting any. Not even a display unit. This was three days ago. The 920 was in short supply. Neither store had sold any. The rep said she had a 900 and it’s gathering dust in her purse, so wasn’t thrilled about either. Interesting both stores brought to the Surface instead of showing me the Windows phones. Hmmmm, btw, why is the Surface $700 at Att without a keyboard?
I went to the AT&T store in downtown Boston on Friday, release day. Just to check them out and compare 920 to 8X. It was about 12:30. They were just getting the 920 displays set up, they had a single red on display. There was a lot of interest, a line of people to try the one demo. They had no 8X on display, I was told they had only gotten one in. Not being able to compare, I left. Went back in at 10:00 a.m. on Saturday. They had sold out their entire stock of 920’s, about 40-45 units. They had all the colors of the 920 out on display. They still had the single 8X to sell, a blue one. I bought the 8X (although it’s a little small for me coming from the Titan). Every sales person in the store was wearing a WP8 shirt, and they were definitely marketing the devices. What a change from the WP7 release. I’ve opened discussion topics for the 8X on the AT&T forum and XDA forum, not a single person has responded that they have the device. I think I may be the only person in US who has one 🙂
I went to the AT&T store by my house and they had a pretty big event. There were Nokia reps there and they sold all 60 Lumia 920s. I bought the last two. I live in a small Midwest suburb, and they sold out on launch day. Your article seems false from my perspective.
You mean they sold 60 Lumias and that’s a hit? Come on. I am desparately waiting to see Yellow & Red Lumia and decide which one to buy but not able to get my hands on them.
I’m not sure why anyone is even arguing the point made in the article. This was supposed to be the big comeback, with massive advertising (ridiculous figures quoted) and WP8 benefitting from the “halo” effect of Windows 8. The reality is there is practically no marketing being done for either product and WP8 is becoming as rare as Hen’s teeth. People will often say “its a marathon, not a sprint” but at some point you actually have to get in the race. As it stands now WP8 hasnt even made it to the starting lineup.
There are 6 AT&T stores all with Black and White Lumia’s in stock within 25 miles of me, it’s not really vapor ware. When I went to the AT&T store on Lumia’s launch all the sales people were pushing people to go with the Lumia 920, so I would imagine they would get more than 3 sales over the past week.
Yes, I agree with David K here. Even though Windows Phone 8 is announced and sole, it is limited in devices. And this is due to Carrier’s butt-headedness and leaning mentality of Microsoft and its OEM partners.
I am not sure how stupid AT&T is selected as premier carrier, when they don’t allow customers to early upgrade their phones to Lumia 920 and they happily do that if you are switching to iPhone. don’t get me wrong I am with AT&T since 1998, and with new Cingular/AT&T (when they got merged) from 2004. And they didn’t let me upgrade (just one month push I asked) to Lumia 920. In order to get my device, I am going to Microsoft Store and they said they would let me early upgrade. And At&T is also premier carrier for Nokia Lumia line, and most of the customer facing AT&T reps don’t carry that device. They carry iPhones. So much for being a premier carrier. If Microsoft and its partners like Nokia don’t get intervene into the matters with AT&T, I am seeing this is going to be another WP7 story.
Cannot agree more.
I love clickbait, so I’ll play along. Let’s generate some clicks with nonsensical titles and articles with no substance! Let’s give it a go, shall we? How ’bout this one: “Windows Phone 8 Makes Breasts Smaller” or “Windows Phone 8: Should Be Called Windows Phone Hate!” or “Windows Phone 8: Microsoft Wants To Eat Your Children” or “Windows Phone 8: Proof that Microsoft Hates Jews”. That’ll get some clicks, yes? Clickety Clickety!
Agree with this article. This is my exact observation as well. Might be people are buying online, but it never went out of stock for online shopping. It does mean not many are buying, atleast in US. In T-Mobile store, some stores have no stock of any color. Some stores have stock but either just Black or just White. One ATT store told me they only received one Red Lumia 920 to start with and never received another Red after 5 days of launch
I posted about this before but it’s true, I went to get a phone on Monday and the new, big AT&T store near me was out of stock. They told me they only got 8 in for launch day. They might be getting more in next week he said.
My att store isn’t nearly as bad. They loved the 927 they even got a visit from “the Nokia lady” according to them.
Store all around the Seattle are got lots of phones, and sold out. Some were MS people–but MS employees get a free one eventually.
Bellevue Square store sold out 60+ phones in less than two hours Sat morning.
Redmond Town Center had 160+ phone Sat morning–I went there to get mine. While in line, reds sold out. They did get the wireless charging plates in stock, so I walked out with one. Hour+ lines.
Calling around Sat, most stores were getting small shipments every few days.
Incredible phone so far.
BTW, yellow and cyan are online order only. Some stores may have sold some demos, but most people ordered them.
Oooo click bait! 😉
I’ll go with you half-and-half. They sold out; but simply because they underestimated (accidently or on purpose?) demand. The little store I went to had them. I should probably check the others, for research sake.
If any other product sold out because they underestimate demand, do you call it vaporware? REGARDLESS of the item or how much it sold. Yes, Apple can sell hundreds of thousands and sell out. Because they have that much of a head-start, a following, whatever. Tickle-me-Elmo sold out the first Christmas: they underestimated the Rosie O’Donnell factor. Vaporware? Someone on etsy.com sells out of [insert homemade craft item here]. Vaporware? Quantity is irrelevant. The fact that it is sold out en masse is relevant. Like any other company, the manufacturers (which are Samsung, Nokia, and HTC, not Microsoft) need to step up production quickly, or they risk their customers going elsewhere. What Microsoft should do is crack the whip. Or make their own @#$% phone. Mark my words: It Will Happen. Apple is TOO successful with that strategy for MS to not copy them. It needs to happen sooner rather than later.
My area sold out of the Lumia 920 pretty quickly. We have a number of international businesses headquartered here and consequently a significant corporate presence. That’s probably why AT&T has traditionally given the region a good amount of attention with solid coverage and LTE early on. Even so, every one of the AT&T stores in the area sold out quickly. The store I was in only had 2 red & 1 white left by Sunday, and those were gone by the end of the day. (I want a matte black model, so I’m still waiting for the stores to be restocked.)
At least they had the phones on display and the reps seemed to know what they were about. Little to no signage, though.
BTW, those phones are GORGEOUS.
Well lookee there. I just checked AT&T’s site for availability again (after checking earlier in the day), and apparently two local stores got white phones this afternoon. Still no black phones, though. Bummer.
Locally of the 4 stores I checked 2 AT&T stores had a couple white in stock while the sales clerk said they had only gotten a single red but they had about a dozen white and black. It is definitely doing better than Win 7 as at least the stores knew what I was talking about and did have 1 demo, While standing there talking 1 guy came up and asked about it- he owns a custom detailing shop and wanted to get 1 for all his employees to replace the iPhones they currently have which he said were too fragile. Anyway- the local Radioshack actually had a couple black 920’s in stock though no demo or signage so there is some vendors than only AT&T.