Microsoft failure causes Sidekick data loss
updated 07:05 pm EDT, Sat October 10, 2009
T-Mobile warns Sidekick loss permanent
T-Mobile this Saturday has issued a warning to all Sidekick owners that their online data may have been permanently lost by Danger and its parent company Microsoft. In a note to customers, the carrier says the likelihood of recovering contacts, calendars and other information taken offline by a more than week-long outage is "extremely low" due to an assessment of the server failure. Customers may lose all their information if they have to reset their sidekicks or deprive them of power, according to the note.
No explanation has been given for the particular cause of the failure, though a status update is due on Monday. T-Mobile has already promised credit for a month's worth of data service to all active Sidekick owners.
Neither Danger nor Microsoft has provided specific comment on the outage. However, the latest news follows an uncertain but potentially damaging information leak that suggests Microsoft has dramatically scaled back Sidekick support and left both the phones and their online-centered service with little infrastructure to cope with large-scale failures. The Sidekick has long been unique as a messaging phone heavily dependent on its online sync and was one of the first to have its own centralized app store in the Download Catalog, a service which now may not be accessible.
The rumor sources claim that Microsoft cut resources both because of lost employees in the Danger team as well as its desire to transfer users to the Pink project for Microsoft-branded phones.
No excuse
10/10, 08:07pm reply
No company should ever go this cheap on backups.
lolcat789
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Sep 2009
Microsoft mobile strategy?
10/11, 12:34am (1 reply) reply
Windows Mobile 6.5 just shipped to mediocre-at-best reviews, and I've personally had enough bad experiences with Windows Mobile phones to not trust them anymore.
Now here's another failure of a Microsoft-owned mobile telecom entity.
Word is that the group working on those "Pink" phones has been shrinking as the former Danger people in it get fed up and leave, and that the project is seriously endangered because of it before they even actually ship anything.
When it comes to mobile phones, I don't know what Microsoft is going to run out of first, bullets or feet.
phillymjs
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Joined: Jun 2000
where's luckyday
10/11, 07:15am reply
come out and plaaaaaaaaay
climacs
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Sep 2001
Yeah Microsoft is so unreliable!
10/11, 10:11am reply
To anybody Microsoft represents data loss. When you get a virus on your computer means you got to reformat and or system recovery that means data loss. Now that if you have a Sidekick you just experience data loss because of Microsoft. This should be a lesson if these people would had a iPhone none of this would have happened to them and especially if they had MobileMe. Lets go over it again, Microsoft = Data Loss and Apple = Data Backed Up and Saved. Any Questions?
LEStudios
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Joined: Jul 2008
and....
10/11, 10:56am (2 replies) reply
We know Apple has never lost data on Mobile me/.Mac. Oh, wait....nevermind...
testudo
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Aug 2001
double-standard
10/11, 11:20am (1 reply) reply
If this was Apple doing this with MobileMe they would be pilloried in the press for weeks. it would be one of the biggest stories of the season with massive negative fallout. As it's Microsoft though, it's a quiet little story appearing on a Sunday and will probably get little if any coverage come Monday, let alone Tuesday.
Gazoobee
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Feb 2009
the difference is...
10/11, 02:50pm (1 reply) reply
the difference is... nobody's SURPRISED when microsoft frappes up like this.
'microsoft hoses millions' is totally a 'dog bites man' story.
darkelf
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Joined: Nov 2003
it is remarkable
10/11, 03:02pm reply
how often Microsoft F's in the A its customers and partners.
climacs
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Joined: Sep 2001
good one
10/11, 04:19pm reply
testudo. way to stay on topic! your insights are always fresh and insightful. oh wait...
nat
Junior Member
Joined: Mar 2002
Interesting story...
10/11, 11:23pm reply
I think this is the way of the cloud, and is worrisome. I have been an iDisk wanna-be user for a while now, and there is no frackin way that I would ever trust real data there. I started on whatever that system was called before mobileme, and it's not gotten much better except for a nice interface that lures you in, puts you to sleep, and then loses your data before you can wake up. I can see that this is the way of the future, but they have been saying that since dumb terminal days back in the 70's. At some point ya gotta think...is the way of the future just not the way...and perhaps there is a better way?
herojig
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Joined: Jul 2009