Windows Mobile 6.5 Becomes Official Today [Microsoft Unveils Marketplace and My Phone Service]

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October 6 2009 will remain in history as the day when Microsoft officially announced its Windows Mobile 6.5 mobile OS together with two new services for its mobile customers: the Marketplace and My Phone.

Should you hurry into your favorite carrier’s store and get a Windows Mobile 6.5? We hate to be the bearers of bad news but the new OS Microsoft is proposing isn’t all that great. It’s rather a transitional solution to Windows Mobile 7, the mobile OS that Microsoft really wants to launch.

But what about the new services available? The Windows Marketplace for Mobile is an application storefront similar to the one found on the iPhone which will grant you access to Windows Mobile 6.5 applications. The My Phone service is a web-based backup and sharing service similar to Apple’s MobileMe. Should we be excited about them? Yes we should! The two services will definitely improve your mobile experience no matter what Windows Mobile OS version you’ll be running in the future.

The Marketplace will offer you a web and on phone user interface which should help you acquire all the apps you want. The app store offers you two different payment methods: instant credit card purchase or monthly phone bill bundled together with your carrier billing. The store will be available in 29 countries starting today so you should have no problem downloading all the extra content you want for your Windows Mobile 6.5 phone. The Marketplace offers features like a search bar, featured apps showcase, apps categories, 24-hour refund period (1 refund available per month), re-download support for paid apps and Windows Live ID compatibility. So far there are about 100 applications waiting to be downloaded, and most of them are games. That number should significantly increase in the following months.

My Phone will let you backup and access your contacts, calendar, text messages, photos and videos as long as you don’t exceed your 200MB allotted storage space. My Phone comes with social networking support for Flickr, Facebook, MySpace and Windows Live. Other neat and very useful features will be available to Premium users. You’ll be able to force the phone to ring even when on silent mode, remotely lock the handset, locate it on the map and remotely erase its contents. The Premium version will be available for free for 60 days. After that you’ll have to treat each Premium service presented above like an independent paid app and order it from the Marketplace.

What are your thoughts on Microsoft’s Marketplace and My Phone?