smoked

Nokia Australia is planning to host two "Smoked by Windows Phone" challenges in Australia this coming weekend. The two marketing events will take place in Sydney and Melbourne but will contain a twist to differentiate from the generic Windows Phone challenge, according to the team. With Nokia UK challenging the general public with common smartphone tasks to see if they survive or are dared to engage in fearful activities, we could be in for some exciting ideas in Australia.

A cash prize ($100) is available should you manage to best the Windows Phone challenge, but should you lose... we'll have to wait and see - though we expect to see some dares. If you have an Android or Symbian device, the iPhone, a BlackBerry, or even a Windows Phone yourself, you will be eligible to participate - though we're not entirely sure how a Windows Phone smartphone can enter against an identical handset. Fastest finger first?

Microsoft has released a number of new advertisements that carry on the "Smoked by Windows Phone" marketing campaign, which started at CES 2012 earlier this year. Ben ('The PC Guy') Rudolph heads up the adverts that are set to air on TV. The above video shows Rudolph challenging a member of public on the streets of Seattle (as opposed to Microsoft Stores) to see who can locate and share a restaurant with friends the fastest.

We like the new style used in the videos, which appear to be slightly more calm and focus more on the beauty of Windows Phone instead of simply how many wins the platform can achieve. Rudolph runs the participant through exactly why Windows Phone is more efficient at everyday tasks. Luckily, he gave Ramona a shiny new cyan Lumia 900 so Android wont slow her down in future.

Be sure to check out the Microsoft YouTube playlist of the advertisements to view the rest.

Source: Microsoft (YouTube playlist); via: Windows Team Blog

The Nokia-like Smoked by Windows Phone campaign, Blown Away by Lumia, has gone to Bulgaria with public heading through popular shopping malls in Sofia being challenged to beat the Lumia 800. Already witnessed in other countries, including India which produced some interesting (yet humorous) results, the challenge is successful at pulling in the punters to show off Microsoft's platform powering Nokia products.

Popular Bulgarian artist Deo took to the helm and led the team through the challenges. These included uploading photos to Facebook, opening web pages and posting status updates to social networks - basic smartphone tasks. Should the participant beat the Lumia 800, they'd pocket 50 lev, but if they failed they'd have to publicly admit defeat.

Check out some more shots after the break.

Source: MobileBulgaria; thanks Eirenach for the tip!

Microsoft's Smoked by Windows Phone began way back in January at the 2012 CES conference. Since, it's grown by leaps and bounds traveling to various Microsoft Stores across the nation and world wide.  We've even seen the Smoke by Windows Phone challenges held by former Miss World, Priyanka Chopra.

Ben Rudolph, who started all this, has released some numbers associated with the Smoked by Windows Phone.

• 95%: Windows Phone's global winning percentage
• 36: The number of countries running Smoked by Windows Phone promotions
• 50,000+: The number of phones that have been smoked by a Windows Phone
• 8,000,000+: The total number of views the Smoked by Windows Phone has generated since it launched in January.
• 100,000,000+: The estimated number of people who have seen, participated in or read about Smoked by Windows Phone. 

The Smoked by Windows Phone campaign will continue with a new set of internet ads hitting the web today. The ads are also available over at the Windows Phone YouTube Channel. While the Smoked by Windows Phone has had its moments of controversy, the campaign has brought a lot of attention to how well our Windows Phones measures up against the competition.

Source: Windows Team Blog

Although the "Smoked by Windows Phone" campaign will always be controversial due to its selective nature, they're still fun to watch and occasionally surprise us. Malaysia is now getting in on the action and while this contest business is a bit "old" for us we have to understand that for a lot of folks, it's not.

In the above video, a different Ben from Microsoft takes on others in the challenge to beat Windows Phone during various predetermined tasks. Nothing new there but at 1:50 we do see a challenger with the brand new quad-core HTC One X, considered by many to the new top of the line Android phone (see AndroidCentral's review). The challenge was simple: take a photo of yourself, upload it to Facebook and tag it, but due to some fumbling around with the One X, the poor participant gets his beat fairly easily.

Of course it doesn't make the One X any less impressive as this contest is a bit fixed with tasks that favor Windows Phone. And perhaps with a different user the One X would have been a lot more effective at competing. But the purpose of the "Smoked" campaign is not to be fair but rather to demonstrate the efficiency of Windows Phone for common tasks that users are likely to use everyday. That focus on simplicity is important and while Windows Phone may not be the absolute winner, it does hold its own against Android and iOS.

By the end of the event, we can see Windows Phone had 98 challenges with 92 wins and 6 losses. Not too bad. And kudos to Microsoft for showing Windows Phone getting smoked by a beaten up, six year old Nokia 3250.

Source: YouTube; via SoyaCincau; Thanks, Johnny, for the heads up

The Windows Phone team has taken the Smoked by Windows Phone challenge to Italy with a steady stream of contestants attempting to best the platform. Should they lose they would (as usual) have to hold up a sign and announce they've been smoked by a Windows Phone. But should they win, and this is the interesting part, they'd pocket a pair of headphones.

What's so interesting about the headphones? They're shaped like a giant phone.

Possibly the coolest prize from the challenge? The Windows Phone Italy team has been keeping everyone up-to-date with latest happenings on their Twitter account, paying particular attention to the charts which record the wins / loses. According to the photos published, Windows Phone appeared to have been holding its own successfully.

Check out more photos after the break. Via: Plaffo

The Smoked by Windows Phone marketing campaign has been extended by Microsoft until April 12th. Those with competitor smartphones will be able to pop into participating Microsoft Stores and attempt to challenge an employee to best the Windows Phone. The campaign recently came under fire for employees supposedly bending the competition rules, ensuring Microsoft's platform won regardless.

Those who manage to beat the Windows Phone will not be receiving a limited edition Hunger Games laptop, priced at $1,000. Instead the store will offer a $1,000 gift card ("hello fancy new Windows 8 tablet") to the first 10 winning participants and a $25 gift card to the first 250 who lose. Are you eligible? Check against the below points:

• Your smartphone must be activated with a cellular carrier;
• Your smartphone must be able to fully power off prior to the Challenge;
• Your smartphone must have the basic functionality required to compete in the Challenge including, but not limited to: check weather/movie, take pictures and post online, text, post on Facebook, find nearby restaurants, update status on social media, and translate web pages into English; and
• Your smartphone must use the original, unmodified operating system that came standard on Your smartphone.
• Smartphones that have had Challenge scenarios pre-loaded are excluded.

What's different about this wave is employees will ask the participant to pick a challenge card at random, which will dictate the scenario (example: take a photo and upload to Facebook). This will help prevent any future issues that could possibly arise.

Source: Micrsoft Store, via: AnythingbutiPod; thanks William for the tip!

Although we could argue that the 'Smoked by Windows Phone' campaign is getting a bit tired, Nokia evidently shot some video last month where they took the same idea but they called the it "Lumia Challenge".

The concept was the same -- challenge people on specific tasks using their smartphone -- if you win, you get £10 for your trouble, if you don't you have to mug for the camera.

The results should be familiar with many folks, especially on the iPhone 4, getting beat by the Lumia 800. Of course, we're seeing the polished commercial video so we don't know how many instance where Nokia lost. But all of that is besides the point, isn't it? This is advertising and we know that Windows Phone is a very fast, nimble and efficient mobile OS -- it doesn't need to win every time, it just needs to win enough to show that yes, there are some significant advantages versus its competition.

And for some reason, with the Nokia music playing and their shallow depth of field video, all of this looks just a bit cooler.

Source: YouTube; Thanks, Ellis B., for the heads up!

Don't colour us surprised if this is true to some extent as it's a simple marketing stunt that involves cash, but reports are coming in that the Smoked by Windows Phone challenges are sometimes rigged, or those who actually beat Microsoft's OS were denied their win / prize. Not only are relatively large sums of money involved, but Microsoft recently bumped the stakes to include a limited edition PC worth $1,000.

According to Sahas Katta, from Skatter Tech, he was wrongfully robbed of his glory (and brand-spanking new PC) by a Microsoft employee who refused to accept that his Android handset won. Katta went along to the Santa Clara Microsoft Store to give the challenge a go after hearing about the stakes increase. Using an Android handset with widgets galore to combat the Windows Phone live tiles, Katta felt prepared for the task that would be presented to him by the employee. 

"The Microsoft Store employee I was up against then explained the selected challenge. Her exact words were the following: 'bring up the weather of two different cities.' The one who could do that first would win. I felt like I struck gold since I knew I already had two weather widgets on my home screen: one for my current location (San Jose, CA) and another for Berkeley, CA.

After a three-second count down, I hit the power button on my phone and said 'DONE!' out loud. I had disabled the lock screen entirely, which is a rather awesome out-of-the-box feature of Android that takes you straight to the home screen with a single push of the power button. I didn’t even need to touch the screen, since the two weather widgets were already there."

According to Katta, having won the challenge by a mere few seconds, the employee turned around to say that Windows Phone won because "it displays the weather right there." Confusing indeed since that's exactly what the Android widgets did as well - they both displayed the weather 'right there'. After speaking to a manager and receiving bizarre reasons as to why he lost, Katta left the Microsoft Store empty handed. 

All we'll say is: it's not the first time a company has had problems with a marketing stunt, so we shouldn't be surprised if - in this case - the Smoked by Windows Phone challenge differs between employees, or is judged slightly differently. Though I would like to add that the manager should have handled the situation more professionally, if what Katta reported on had actually occurred. (And this is a big "if" as we're just taking their word).

Have you been to challenge Microsoft and Windows Phone in the challenges? If so, did you notice any cheating?

Source: Skatter Tech; thanks Sandy for the heads up!