Nokia: we're committed to Windows Phone 7

"Maroon 5 came through Helsinki; I didn't know and I was so pissed! They played some little club. Are you kidding me! I could have gone to see Maroon 5 in a club!

Shields:

[Nokia Music] is like boom, done! I use it to discover music."

"I sent the Music guys an email; you've got to get the gig finder to help me with this." He isn't promising anything specific but: "they're all over it!"

It's not just apps and updates. Nokia isn't going to stop making new Windows Phone 7 handsets, especially for the low-price market that Tango was designed for.

"We're going to be committed to both for quite some time. Windows Phone 7 will remain an important part of our arsenal for growing the Windows Phone ecosystem. It will take a while for us to get all the investments in place to have Windows Phone 8 address that broad an audience.

"The stuff that's coming in Windows Phone 8; most of it is hardware dependant. No matter how hard I work on software I can't make it add hardware to phones", said Shields.

More hardware, better choice

"Ones and zeroes don't create these things. By definition, Windows Phone 7 runs on a set of chipsets that Windows Phone 8 doesn't run on.

"By definition, there are more chipsets if you include Windows Phone 7. It doesn't take a math scientist to figure out that more probably means you're going to have a better opportunity to address a larger market with different designs."

The way to think about Windows Phone 8 isn't about whether you could squeeze a few more features onto current hardware.

It's about what phones you'll be able to make once the Windows kernel opens up access to a whole new range of hardware.

"I think what Microsoft is doing with Windows Phone is super wise," Shields told us. "It's an investment in the future that will eventually be shifting gears into a place where you can really have a wide variety of chipsets down the road."