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Comment by AlexDanger | Hacker News Reader

If this holo tech gets real traction I'd hope (and expect) that they'd go cross-platform with iOS/Android as first class platforms. I like WinMo but its not exactly hoovering up market share from Apple and Android.

Microsoft seems a bit more pragmatic about multi-platform now. I'm sure the business model will revolve around running your holo-server on an Azure instance or running holo-skype meetings from your corporate Office 365 subscription tied to your corporate iPad. They are moving towards device/platform agnostic services. The lock-in is server side in the cloud :)

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Microsoft is pushing Windows Holographic as OS.

It is a Windows platform where you can place 2D windows in 3D space while some applications can display 3D graphics. You end up e.g. having a browser on one wall, a photos app on another wall, and a weather app on a third wall. It is not quite there yet, I think. But it is actually pretty cool!

For now, it feels like Microsoft is way ahead of Apple and Google on the OS side.

But isn't it just because they show things in development? Apple doesn't do that. And Google has learned a few lessons in that regard too.

Hmm... Not entirely sure.

Windows Holographic is out there with end-users. Albeit with some/many shortcomings and obviously still being developed (like every other OS) -- I would compare it more to iOS 1.0, which was pretty stable but also had many short comings.

Apple and Google haves not released anything for end-users or even demoed anything... so I still feel Microsoft is ahead. Obviously, I don't know what Apple and Google are working on internally (or Microsoft for that matter).

I know this isn't exactly what you meant, but people have been able to run azure instances for the sharing service that the hololens can hook into. It's awesome, I'm so glad to have had the chance to work with the hololens and AR.

Sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if they had to whip up custom hardware to make it happen. I'd think you'd want 3D cameras on the phone, plus AR glasses that would need to be light enough for travel.

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