Before the launch of the Nokia Lumia 800 Windows Phone 7 browser market share, as measured by Statcounter, was relatively flat, but we can see from around week 46, when the Nokia Lumia 800 launched in 5 European countries, but not Finland, that the share was starting to rise, possibly due to imports from other EU countries.

The handset was however officially released there this week, and while we had reports of great sales, this graph is the first real evidence of massive uptake, which seems to have increased the installed base of handsets by 50%.

Hopefully we will see this graph continue to rise as Nokia’s homeland adopt their new OS direction.

Talking about advertising fails, on AT&T’s website the much lauded HTC Titan is currently being promoted with a flash animation as running Android 2.2. 

The other defining features of the handset is similarly murdered – the 4.7 inch screen is replaced with a 3.8 inch one, and the 8 megapixel camera with a 5 megapixel one.

See the flash animation, hopefully before AT&T yanks it, here.

Thanks Leon for the tip.

Share Services have released version 2.1 of IM+, the cross platform, cross protocol IM network that supports all major IM services, including Facebook, Skype, Google Talk, Yahoo!, AIM/iChat, ICQ, MySpace, Jabber, VKontakte, Yandex IM and Mail.Ru Agent.

Version 2.1 brings Shape Services’s very own IM network, which they bill as a replacement for SMS, much like WhatsApp.

BEEP is available in IM+ Pro and on Windows Phone ,  iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Android and BlackBerry. BEEP works via push notification and features delivery confirmation.

Whenever you send and receive text messages or photos, IM+ Beep will make sure that your message was successfully sent and notify you when it is safely delivered. Push will make incoming messages instantly pop up on your device.

Other new features in version 2.1 include:

• Set own avatar" option
• Options to group contacts by account and group offline contacts
• Search contacts by IM service name
• Redesign of IM+ Live Tile

IM+ comes in a free ad supported version and a Pro version which costs €4,99. Find the app in Marketplace here.

Via Plaffo.com

The face of the Windows Phone 7 Marketplace, Brandon Watson, is leaving Microsoft to head to Amazon.

There he will be Director of the Kindle Cross Platform team, working on the product development roadmap for Kindle apps across all first- and third-party platforms worldwide, including the Windows Phone app and the Windows 8 app.

He told Mary Jo Foley “it was a hard decision, but the opportunity placed in front of me that was too big to pass up.”

No replacement has been announced yet.

At WMPoweruser.com we have had our clashes with Brandon, but the proof of his success is the 60,000 odd apps in Marketplace, and we can but regret his departure and wish him the best for the future.

Colorful is an app to help the color blind to recognize, tag and compare colours.

The app features:

• Use advanced filters that will compensate for your specific colour deficiency.
• Recognize colours in your surroundings using the new Mango camera capabilities.
• Save up to 3 colour tags for future reference and comparison.
• Save an image with the additional information given by Colorful algorithms.

Just this weekend the basic version of the  app is free in Marketplace. 

Find it in Marketplace here.

If you are in USA and looking to buy a Windows Phone, it may be worth your while to make a detour to a Microsoft store (16 locations, country-wide) as they are offering 12 months worth of free Zune Pass $120 worth) for free with a purchase of a new Windows Phone 7 handset.

The deal expires on the 14th February, just in time to give the love of your life a new Windows Phone all loaded up with music already.

Via WPCentral.com

T-Mobile Austria thought it would be a good idea to remind buyers that Windows Phone 7 does have a Facebook app, and ran this add showing a father interrogating his daughter’s boyfriend based on his Facebook profile.

So far so good, but the creators of the ad also felt for some reason the official Windows Phone 7 Facebook app was not familiar enough, and Photoshopped the iOS Facebook app onto the very Windows Phone Nokia Lumia 710.

Showing that Windows Phone has the essential apps that users expect on the platform is a great idea, but showing off the distinctive UI of Windows Phone 7 is another, and we hope that future Windows Phone marketing will work a bit harder at doing this.

Via hypertechtronium.com

Thanks Martin for the tip.

Peter Wissinger, director for Microsoft’s Mobile Business Group in the Nordic countries have posted on Facebook yesterday what he called a Nokia Lumia (sales) report.

He notes that now that the Nokia Lumia 800 has become available in all Nordic countries sales have been far above expectations and fore-casts, and made a particular note that sales in Finland were TOTALLY “unlikely” (presumably unbelievable).

Reports from Finland so far has been of long queues and shops selling out of the handset, which suggests user acceptable of Nokia’s move from Symbian to Windows Phone 7 may be much higher than expected.

Thanks Omar for the tip.

Whole Google is busy scaring users by violating their privacy, Microsoft is taking advantage by showing Google Docs users how easy it is to move to a Microsoft alternative – Skydrive and Office 365.

From the video it seems its no more than a 3 step process, and of course also means you will be able to edit your docs using the native client on Windows Phone 7 also.

Via YouTube.com

Canalys have released their 2011 and Q4 2011 estimates, and have for the first time placed a solid number on Nokia’s Windows Phone 7 shipments.

They note 2.5 million Windows Phones were shipped in Q4 2011, with 1.2 million of those being by Nokia, giving it 48% of the market, remarkably close to the 45% we estimated from other data.

They also demolish the notion that Nokia shipped more Meego powered Nokia N9’s that Lumia handsets, saying only 0.6 million of those handsets were shipped then, close to the 0.5 million estimated by AllaboutSymbian.com.

Canalys says about Nokia:

“Its first Windows Phone products, the Lumia 800 and 710, along with the recently announced Lumia 900 through AT&T in the US, have improved the outlook for Nokia,” said Canalys Senior Analyst, Tim Shepherd. “They are well-designed, competitive devices that demonstrate innovation is still alive within Nokia. But the battle is not over and it has huge challenges ahead. Nokia must continue to build out its Lumia portfolio with devices tailored to address all price points and all the markets in which it aims to compete. It must hasten its transition from Symbian to Windows Phone around the world and, with Microsoft, promote and generate excitement for the platform and new products. And it must succeed in attracting more developers to build high quality, locally relevant apps.”

In total Canalys estimates 6.8 million Windows Phones were shipped in 2011, a pretty low number. With 2.85 million handsets shipped at launch in Q4 2010, that bring a total of around 9.65 million handsets shipped so far.

In total Windows Phone holds 1.6% of the market.  This should increase in 2012 as Nokia increases its roll-out and Windows Phone itself rolls out to more countries such as China in the middle to later part of the year.

Read the full report at Canalys here.

Thanks Arun for the tip.