Ed Bott on the dire outlook for Windows Phone:

If the problems with Windows Phone as a platform were as simple as Microsoft getting their product strategy together, it would probably be easy to fix. But that focus ignores the real problem.

This isn’t an equal partnership between Microsoft and U.S. mobile carriers, except perhaps in the most technical sense.

Thanks to Microsoft’s minuscule market share (small single-digit percentages in the U.S.), the carriers have almost no interest in collaborating with it on mobile devices. And Microsoft has almost no leverage when negotiating with carriers. The resulting not-so-virtuous circle is what stacks the deck against the Windows Phone platform and makes the experience so frustrating for the few who actually use it.
Maybe if Microsoft asks Santa for more customers, they’ll get em.