>>>>>>>http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/02/17/microsoft_bans_opensource_windows_phone/
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>So now Microsoft (who's recently claimed to be a friend of open source) has banned open source from it's windows phone 7 marketplace.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Are they just TRYING to loose ground in the mobile phone market or what? I think this is another HUGE mistake.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>I heard about this back when Windows phone 7 started - also the "no more than 3 free apps in the marketplace" rule and more...
>>>>>
>>>>>What? You mean if you're a developer you can't upload more than three freeware apps to the marketplace?
>>>>
>>>>We had a user group meeting here that Brian Hitney spoke at that I didn't get to attend and it was on Windows Phone 7. According to some of the developers I work with, the information he put out included that restriction. I can't verify it, but they all came back with that same information.
>>>
>>>Well that seems ridiculous - why would you want to limit the number of apps for this OS? Talk about shooting yourself in the foot! How do they expect to get anyone willing to write software for this platform with stupid restrictions like these?
>>
>>Only the number free apps you can submit is limited was my understanding...
>
>Right, but those are the ones that would make the platform more desirable to users. Less free apps = less users = less chance to sell an app. Plus if you're a developer or company that has 100 freeware apps available, a user is going to assume apps from that dev/company are backed by a company that knows what they're doing - thus helping them sell apps. I wonder if this applies to 'shareware' apps - ones that have a time-limited demo but are still free to download. Surely they wouldn't be THAT lame.....???

I agree. I also don't know if MSFT has backed off from that restriction yet or not. It created a heated discussion during the usergroup (I was told). Of course, keep in mind this is all based on that one meeting so I don't know how accurate it is. I haven't tried to submit 4 free apps (yet) I haven't even submitted 1 yet :o)