Windows Marketplace to allow application sharing for up to five devices

Microsoft Corp. plans to let customers of its upcoming Windows Marketplace for Mobile run purchased apps on as many as five Windows Mobile phones at the same time.

This would primarily benefit individuals owning multiple smartphones running the Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system, which is needed to access Microsoft’s online store.

But it could also allow users to share apps by "authorizing" the phones of close friends and family using the same generation of Windows Mobile phone, said Daniel Bouie, a senior product planner for Microsoft, during a talk last week at the software maker’s Tech Ed conference.

Marketplace customers will also be able to get a no-questions-asked refund on an application provided it is within 24 hours of purchase, Bouie said.

Apps can be downloaded as many times as needed, to re-install on replacement or upgraded phones, provided users don’t go over the five-phone limit, Bouie said.

Microsoft will use its LiveID authentication system for tracking. "It will be very hard for the casual, semi-casual or semi-pro user to pirate apps," Bouie said.

He disagreed that app sharing will anger the developers Microsoft needs to woo.

"We feel comfortable that using our LiveID system to help connect products to five devices is a great balance of the needs of both developers and end users," Bouie wrote in a follow-up e-mail. "We see this as a permanent feature, and we’ve gotten great positive feedback from the vast majority of developers we’ve talked with about this."

Microsoft is working on letting developers sell subscriptions to apps, though it won’t be ready by the Marketplace’s launch, which will take place in 29 countries.

"I can’t commit to a date, but it will be one of the first things we do" after launch, Bouie said.

via Computer World