Windows Phone Summary of the Week: November 1 - 6, 2011

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It's that time everyone, time for your Windows Phone weekly summary. To kick us off, Dave Blake gives us the latest discussions from our forum. Should an audible breakdown of this week's news be for you, then episode 128 of the WPCentral podcast will be right up your street. Speed on past the break for this week's summary.

Making a start on the highlights of the last six days, Nokia has tripled marketing expenditures for Windows Phone with the recently announced Lumia family of handsets. In London, the manufacturer has teamed up with Spectrum to offer free WiFi across selected boroughs, and if you're not aware, Duudle is the project that won the Nokia World '11 Hackathon. According to the "...I'm a WP7!" app, almost 50% of owners have been updated to Mango. Our Daniel Rubino takes a look at RIM's woes providing Microsoft's platform with ample room for move up to third position, behind the iPhone.

We've received word that Microsoft is rejecting some social apps in Japan due to links being spotted connecting to websites such as 2ch/Futaba (Japanese 4chan equivalent). To liven things up, we have a prepaid app reward program (courtesy of Microsoft) starting up that will see $25 prepaid cards being handed out for purchasing apps from the Marketplace. Fancy unlocking your handset for a small fee? You can with the opening of ChevronWP7 Labs. Closing up the highlights is comScore with their September '11 report, which shows Windows Phone still hovering in marketshare... for now.

Fusion: Sentient is to arrive onto the Marketplace soon, which will be connected to the Xbox 360 version, Fusion: Genesis. Monopoly, the household classic, has made its way onto the Xbox Live Deal of the Week list once again. If you haven't already noticed, Kinectimals for Xbox Live has returned to the Marketplace, ready for download. Tails, the flying fox, has joined Sonic in his Sonic CD adventures, which is an upcoming Xbox Live title, neat! Rise of Glory has been updated to Mango, bringing fancy features and a ringtone.

Have you noticed a change in colour for two accents on your Windows Phone since updating to Mango? You're not alone, and don't fear that it's your eyesight, there has been a slight alteration. Rogers, the Canadian carrier, has made their account app available to customers, which will make keeping track of usage etc. much easier. Nokia is set to release their Maps app to everyone on the platform, opening up the world to all devices. Keeping up support for customers on Symbian, the manufacturer has also made available an app that allows Symbian users to transfer contacts - via Bluetooth - to any Nokia Windows Phone.

Microsoft has added Marketplace Extras to the web Marketplace that helps consumers find apps with staff picks etc. If you're within the homebrew community and use the screen capturing app, would you be interested in taking screen shots of games too? Should you reside in Australia, New Zealand or Europe, we have some good news for you with offline navigation being made available with Turn-by-Turn.

Bing Mobile is going HTML 5 and is bringing new features across the board. This new implementation will make it possible for the team to roll out updates cross-platform without requiring any action from the user. Fuse news reader finally hits v1.3 and receives Mango treatment, Weave has been updated to v3.5, Facebook bumped to v2.2, and Prime TV goes Mango with v2.0.

The recently launched, as in today, Samsung Focus S and Flash will both support WiFi tethering from the off, something we found the Nokia Lumia 800 to lack. We've got our hands on the Focus S and Flash, with reviews coming up soon. If you're waiting for our views, check out our first impressions of the Flash for now (or the HTC Titan if you're feeling almighty). Since we got a Nokia Lumia 800, we decided to take it for a spin and write up an insightful review, should you be deciding whether or not to make the purchase, check our write up. Some features of the 800 include the ability to use the handset effectively in sunlight, but some drawbacks are present with the lack of FF camera, gyroscope and Dolby Digital Plus.

The Nokia Lumia 800 will be available (delivered from carriers/stores too) from November 16th onwards, and has topped the sales charts in France. But should you be wandering what the "Lumia" branding is all about, we take a look into how Nokia is naming handsets for the platform. The HTC Radar 4G is now available to purchase from T-Mobile, and is offering $100 guaranteed for any old phone traded in. Should you not be familiar with the HTC Radar, check out our first impressions.

According to Samsung Belgium, the Samsung Omnia W is set to arrive in December while the Focus S will be U.S. only. But good news for those who wish to see the Nokia Lumia 710 in the states, it could be all packaged and ready to head for T-Mobile as the "Sword". Nokia and ST-Ericsson have signed a deal which sees the hold on Windows Phone held by Qualcomm shatter into pieces.

The fun this week includes a lot of media and promotion, particularly from Nokia. We've seen them take over London Heathrow Airport with huge platforms hanging from the roof, set up their Arch in the recently opened Westfield shopping centre in Stratford, and join Microsoft at the Gamex event in Paris. T-Mobile has also kicked off advertising with a new HTC Radar 4G advert. And if you weren't aware already, Metro is taking over public transport, while Guy Fawkes chills out at the Occupy Wall Street with his Focus.

For developers; Jeff Blankenburg has started a new project - 31 Days of Mango. Bookmark it for tutorials on developing on Mango. You may (or may not be) aware of Microsoft giving out free phones to developers, but now we've got photos of the shipping. Got to love Microsoft's support for developers. Finally, to close us off, MS_Nerd spotted on the Windows Phone hardware requirements page that light and proximity sensors are not available to developers "yet".

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Rich Edmonds
Rich Edmonds
Senior Editor, PC Build

Rich Edmonds was formerly a Senior Editor of PC hardware at Windows Central, covering everything related to PC components and NAS. He's been involved in technology for more than a decade and knows a thing or two about the magic inside a PC chassis. You can follow him on Twitter at @RichEdmonds.