QUOTE said:Microsoft's R&D department has drawn up plans for a slider phone with swappable accessories, a concept previously attempted elsewhere that failed to become a success commercially. The handset in question looks like a regular slider phone, but features detachable parts such as a gaming keypads, second displays and extra batteries.
The plot thickens: these accessories can still be used when not attached to the phone, doubling up as additional control devices for the handset. This includes using the attachments as an extended headset, as a keyboard for use while the phone is connected to a TV set, and as a handsfree control kit for manipulating the handset in vehicles.
Source.
Patent application.
Huh
So either you'll be lugging around a phone and five modules, or limit yourself to one preferred module (which beats the point of having a modular phone), or keeping modules in places where you'll be likely to use them and only carrying the phone around... this could be good, but it could also be very bad. I like the idea of a modular phone, if the modules can be used all at once. And apparently these can. Only in my mind the modules stack up into a single device, instead of juggling five-six devices at once. Oh I dunno, we'll see.
Maybe the phone is actually being developed by someone else and Microsoft is just patent trolling.