Well, Windows Phone fans, you are almost home. Today Microsoft’s YouTube application for Windows Phone will return to the platform’s marketplace.
At last, Google and Microsoft appear to have worked out a compromise that will allow for a fully featured YouTube experience on the latter’s mobile platform. Google and Microsoft have had a fraught year, bickering over email syncing, search dominance and mobile mapping. And the YouTube thing.
Microsoft had pulled its home-built YouTube app for Windows Phone from its mobile store following vociferous Google complaints that resulted in a cease-and-desist letter.
The stakes are somewhat high, if in the distance: Microsoft is hell-bent on building a first-tier mobile platform. Google is dedicated to Android’s continued hegemony. It has scant incentive to grant Microsoft even one extra scrap of oxygen. Windows Phone users have been somewhat caught in the crossfire.
Google once extended its support of Exchange ActiveSync at the proverbial last minute, granting Microsoft enough time to support its CalDAV and CardDAV syncing systems to keep Windows Phone users, who depended on Google web services, happy.
TechCrunch reached out to Microsoft, which provided the following statement: “We’ve released an updated YouTube app for Windows Phone that provides the great experience our consumers expect while addressing the concerns Google expressed in May, including the addition of ads. We appreciate Google’s support in ensuring that Windows Phones customers have a quality YouTube experience and look forward to continuing the collaboration.”
Users will be able to live stream YouTube content that is ongoing, and upload video from their phones.
What matters more than the generic feature breakdown of the application is that it exists at all, at last, with full coronation from both parties. That’s something to be applauded. It has been a scrap for Microsoft to fight for a place at the table. Each time Microsoft has butted heads with the Mountain View search giant, it has always done well by its users in the end. So, if you are a Windows Phone user, here’s a clip to get you started.
Hat Tip to Tom Warren for first spotting this.
Top Image Credit: Vernon Chan