Fighting Reality, Microsoft Will Keep Charging for Windows Mobile

One of the reasons you’re going to see Android on a ton of phones—aside from Google’s juggernautical influence—isn’t because of its ass-beating potential, but because hardware makers don’t have to pay anything for it. They do have to pay for Windows Mobile, the other major free-floating smartphone OS, on the other hand, and Steve Ballmer is saying it’s going to stay that way, even as RIM’s BlackBerry passes it in marketshare. Of course, by the time Windows Mobile 7 finally, finally enters a much more hostile mobile world, he could be singing something very different. [Reuters]