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It’s staggering to think how much things have changed in the cellphone industry over the last few years. Where vendors once measured success largely in terms of units shifted, future success is now measured by the number of apps, games, and devs attracted to each opposing platform in a burgeoning smartphone marketplace. Just last week, Nokia announced that it had lured in some 400,000 new developers over the last year . Now Microsoft is touting a rather meager (by comparison) 15,000 Windows Phone developers “signaling their intent to bring exciting content to Windows Phone.” Enough implied manpower to push well beyond the 3,000 apps and games expected to populate the Windows Marketplace by the end of this week. Of course, objectively measuring a developers intent to develop on a platform is difficult. And really, platform potential is not the primary thing driving the purchasing decision of most consumers — not with so many viable handsets available today . Still, it’s good to see such optimism coupled with the fact that the vast majority of people of the world — gasp! — still don’t use smartphones. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in] Windows Phone 7 Marketplace hits 3,000 apps and games, attracts 15,000 developers originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 25 Nov 2010 09:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink