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Municipality owned infrastructure would be nice but sounds too socialist / Marxist / atheist / Communist / etc. for some people. There are 19 states where it has been outlawed, since "the internet should not operate at the speed of government" or something.

http://www.electronista.com/ar...

Apparently with the next Intel CPU (Broadwell), it won't be possible anymore. http://www.electronista.com/articles/12/11/30/socketless.move.sees.intel.merge.processors.with.motherboard/

The worst downturn the industry has ever seen is a bit hysterical, seriously? The entire industry is losing billions of dollars over something that is being rejected by consumers at a level never before seen in history and you think I'm being hysterical? Do you pay any attention to the industry whatsoever?

http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2013/10/08/northamber_fiscal_13/
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9238326/Windows_8_takes_blame_for_brutal_PC_sales_slide
http://www.electronista.com/articles/13/04/10/apple.toshiba.beating.industry.average.still.suffering.downturns/
http://www.statesman.com/news/business/slump-deepens-for-global-pc-sales/nXH6c/

Things are so bad that some OEM's have stared risking inclusion of third party start menus in a desperate attempt to get consumers to start buying PC's again. Your right that the enterprise will keep using Windows 7 and skip over Windows 8 just like Vista. However unless Microsoft fixes things with Windows 9 (Windows Blue includes a transition to yearly updates to the OS) they will also skip other versions. By the time the enterprise is ready to transition off of Windows 7 it is entirely feasible that other companies (Apple, Ubuntu, Google etc) will finally be ready for the enterprise.

The Start Menu really is that big of a deal.

Incorrect actually.

Can you support your allegation that Apple requires payment? Perhaps you are unaware that Apple transferred the Thunderbolt trademark to Intel. Thunderbolt is not at all proprietary to either Apple or Intel; at least since a couple of years ago. It is Intel who controls Thunderbolt now, and they furnish royalty-free licenses. The allegation is that Intel's policies are holding back Thunderbolt, but Intel denies this fairly convincingly.

This article doesn't have a pop-up ad.

You aren't liable and you'll probably get a successful good free lawyer (well free to you) if anyone gives you grief.

Worried about your door kicked in? I'd say it's your civic duty - and if my reasons aren't good enough for you, maybe you'd consider the optional counter-suits like winning the lottery

So it is your assertion that Microsoft can require the vendor to sell a copy of Windows with every single computer they sell, but are powerless to insist that the system be shipped with the OS as is, sans crapware?

Indeed, that is the case. Microsoft wants to keep crapware off OEM PCs, but it would be an antitrust violation if they tried to force the OEMs to stop bundling it. Remember that the original MS antitrust case involved (among other things) OEMs who wanted to put Netscape as the default browser on their PCs.

I'll defend my sarcasm in light of what AC wrote initially. From the article I linked to, apple seems to have punished him for making it clear that there were holes in their app store security. Not actually exploiting them. That to me sounds like more of a PR move, though I'm not sure that's more boneheaded than banning him simply for violating the TOS. As I said, apples actions seem to be telling him that it would have been better had he given the exploit to someone who would use it maliciously, than broadcasting it to everyone.

As far as google goes, I'm not sure why you keep trying to paint me as a hypocrite for not criticizing them as well. No details ( were given in that ethicalhacker story, and I couldn't immediately find any second source verifying that he had been banned from google, let alone any more details. I did find this suggesting he was working with Google.

So I have to ask why I need to condemn google when I just have one line on one website saying they did the same thing?

So nobody wants something a bit better than a cassette 4 track for demos and they all want to wrangle ProTools or CuBase instead of concentrating on writing, this album doesn't exist, and I didn't write and produce three TV theme tunes and two commercial jingles with it (despite normally using Digital Performer).

Good to see elitist snobbery isn't an exclusive Apple product.

(And FWIW I think iPads are the wrong device for schools)

> The future of computing is $79.95 tablets in
> blister packs at the convenience store.

Yeah, the same way that cheap MP3 players from drugstores totally own the portable music player market. Oh, wait...

There is room in the world for good products. Not coincidentally, Apple is the most valuable company in the world right now because of that.

Furthermore: the dream of ubiquitous computers, so cheap they're practically disposable, goes back quite a ways. 20 years ago, the dream was for something you could carry that was powerful enough to run WordPerfect on. Oh my God, wouldn't that be amazing?!?!?

But the state-of-the-art has advanced. Look at what we expect out of devices today: they should know where we are to within 10 meters with the help of dozens of satellites, what direction we're facing, where we're going, how fast we're moving, show us 360-degree 3D maps derived from satellite imagery, do real-time voice, text, and video communication (at 30fps, naturally) anywhere that we have a wireless network signal, and record and play back high-definition video. (Also, it needs to render Facebook quickly and accurately. Bill Moggridge, God rest his soul, wouldn't've seen that one coming early on.)

By the time today's high-end devices are hanging by a cash register, the new ones--the ones that everyone wants--will have 3D scanners and printers, heart and lung monitors, and God knows what else included. We've already got communicators; next are tricorders and replicators. Possibly transporters. :-)

Hundreds of years ago, people dreamed of indoor plumbing everywhere. And HVAC. And horseless carriages. And motors and power supplies so cheap and plentiful they could be squandered in toys for infants. And food that can be stored for months. And so on. Now we literally walk around with supercomputers in our pockets. 20 years from now there will be a story here about a new computer that's small enough to install in one of your front teeth, not just a molar.

Long story short, Moore's Law will continue to apply, and Apple, Intel, and Microsoft will continue to do just fine.

Another interesting development is that Judge Koh "unexpectedly reversed a lower magistrate's finding and decided to change the jury instructions with regards to the destruction of evidence from Samsung, changing the wording to imply that both Apple and Samsung should be presumed to have destroyed email evidence that could be relevant to the case." and "Despite the fact that there is no evidence that Apple has withheld any such emails, Koh's decision opts to give similar notices about both companies to the jury rather than instruct them on Samsung's deletions only. Koh could have also opted to not mention the evidence spoilation entirely, but chose instead to infer that Apple must also have deleted emails potentially favorable to Samsung's case. Had the previous instructions stood, it would have painted Samsung as more untrustworthy -- a key point in Apple's barrage of evidence."

With Apple and Samsung CEOs holding last-minute talks, it will be interesting to see how this shakes out.

It looks like it is getting thrown out (or at least heading there).

One of the biggest complaints was the lack of multi-camera editing. I'm not that familiar with video editing, but that doesn't sound like a workflow issue to me. The same goes for the lack of RED camera support, which is apparently quite popular with filmmakers.

One particularly damning problem was the inability to import projects from the previous version of the software. Again, not really a workflow issue.

The inability to assign audio tracks I suppose is a workflow issue, though it doesn't appear that any sensible alternative is provided by the software. Of course, "updating" your workflow isn't helpful if that workflow doesn't jive with your other applications. As I understand it, FCPX doesn't support OMF transfers which appears to be a common feature. Given that solutions to many of the missing features in FCPX include the use of third-party software, this kind of omission, well, makes the software somewhat less than professional.

I don't know enough about video editing or the software to give a through critique -- all I can do is report on the problems. That FCPX was anything but a professional tool seems to be the consensus.

All of those were legitimate gripes. However I believe ALL of them have been, or are currently being, addressed, either by Apple, or by others. In one case (FCP 7 import), the 3rd party plugin/add-on is a whopping $10, and in the case of the other, more expensive one (AAF export), there is now a FREE solution.

Acer, along with Toshiba, has by far the worst warranty support in the business. But unlike Toshiba, who have been improving their reliability scores over the years, Acer still uses bottom-shelf parts. These are still the only two companies that won't overnight replacement parts to a qualified technician, and instead send them seven-day mail. Acer is only worth buying if you upgrade like a madman or you can stand being without your machine for a couple of weeks. And every time I say this, someone jumps up to say that they had an Acer and they loved it, and that's fine. Your N is one. My N is greater than a thousand, and I can tell you with certainty and actual statistics that Acers break down like crazy. The only worse are Gateway and HP. Et voila: http://www.electronista.com/articles/09/11/17/reliability.study.has.apple.4th.place/ Also, don't buy Gateway or HP.

#3 is false. Apple 2005 "purple" prototype shows it did not copy Sony

Yes, it could backfire and shut Windows out of ARM. Right now, Windows has no presence on ARM, thankfully, and the Vista 8 'Secure' Boot requirements for ARM might well keep it that way -- if we are lucky.

RIM had a complete internal panic when Apple unveiled the iPhone in 2007, a former employee revealed this weekend. The BlackBerry maker is now known to have held multiple all-hands meetings on January 10 that year, a day after the iPhone was on stage, and to have made outlandish claims about its features. Apple was effectively accused of lying as it was supposedly impossible that a device could have such a large touchscreen but still get a usable lifespan away from a power outlet.

http://www.electronista.com/articles/10/12/27/rim.thought.apple.was.lying.on.iphone.in.2007/

Well - pity for those in the US, they wont get the new stuff now...

Fortunately the rest of the world can enjoy all those things that are forbidden in the US. Seems the US is no longer the place to get your new stuff.
Now I am the last one to say anything about the quality or something, but at least the rest of the rest of the world has a free choice.

The same issues Google/Samsung/Motorola ran afoul off in the USA are also being brought up before governments all over the world.

Google/Motorola is preparing for a major hit where it hurts.

Could you loose your ability to speak if you have been screaming in pain and anger at adverse developments rapidly revealing themselves as you prepare to celebrate your accomplishments?

The blow to Google Android Motorola was prompted by six key congressmen who visited the FTC on Thursday and told them FRAND ABUSE as practiced by Google in protecting Android would not be tolerated as it was anti competitive. In effect they told the FTC to step up their game as they were now watching what transpires.

http://www.electronista.com/articles/12/06/29/civil.investigative.demands.issued.to.google.apple.microsoft/

Overseas the EU is investigating the same FRAND ABUSE issues and is preparing to smack down Google/Motorola for the same reasons. The FTC just provided documents to the EU to help the EU build their case.

http://www.idownloadblog.com/2012/02/19/apple-files-frand-abuse-complaint/

is that after the recently announced bump or didn't she tell you ;)

up to 25% wages
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-06-21/apple-retail-store-workers-said-to-receive-wage-increases.html

and $500 off a mac, $250 off an ipad (every three years) - ON TOP of the 25% discount.
http://www.electronista.com/articles/12/06/21/retina.display.macbook.pros.excluded.from.program/

Mistreatment of employees? Microsoft does none of this.

"The last incidence of a threatened jump over labor conditions was at a plant producing Microsoft's Xbox 360."
http://www.electronista.com/articles/12/04/27/foxconn.central.china.plant.sees.protest/
http://www.examiner.com/article/brazilian-foxconn-workers-threaten-strike-over-poor-working-conditions

And the fact that a very large majority of the non-trivial portions of the code clearly do what they do in different ways to Oracle's implementation.

That's nice, but it's not evidence of a clean-room implementation. It is a good way to avoid copyright infringement.

And that it was an open source project where the practice was to obtain a signed statement from developers providing complete details of exposure to Sun's IP prior to accepting patches from them (see http://harmony.apache.org/auth_cont_quest.html [apache.org] ),

OK, that is evidence of a clean room implementation. How did Sun code end up in Android then?

Also, what was this guy doing working on Android? Having one of the original developers work on Android is certainly not a clean room implementation.

Not to mention that the answer to the question is obviously "yes" in the strict sense that there has to be someone out there who wants a Kindle with a built in light.

In terms of the implication of "do enough people want a light to be a profitable venture?" the answer can only be, "nobody knows at this point, we'll wait and see," although assuredly Amazon must have some confidence that the economics will work out.

Overall, it's just a stupid idea that Slashdot (cough timothy cough) has that the topics benefit from being kickstarted with a question, no matter how silly. It makes the summary read like the introduction to a middle school term paper.

More significanty, there was a study done in 2010 which indicated, contrary to expectations, that reading on a (backlit) iPad is actually easier than reading on a Kindle. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to imagine that Amazon looked at that, followed up with their own studies, and ultimately decided to hedge their bets.

Foxconn hid underage workers

Display, Processor, Chips, Battery, ...But hey, It has an Apple logo!

Actually, Apple has been desperately (and it look like, successfully) trying to become non-dependent upon the technology-thieves at Samsung for a couple of years now. The latest iPad is actually stands as a testament as to the lengths that Apple has gone to cut Samsung completely out of their supply chain.

Display: Designed by Apple. iFixit said it was "probably Samsung". No surprises there. Apple has used Samsung "glass" for years. However, leaked information makes it seem more likely that Apple has turned to Sharp for the iPad 3 Retina display.

SoC (what you quaintly and incorrectly called the "Processor") : Designed by Apple, manufactured in Texas by Apple-owned Fab house, Intrinsity. In fact, Apple's Intrinsity is already the second-largest mobile SoC manufacturer, and ison track to pass Intel as the world's largest mobile chip fab.

Chips: Some are Apple-designed. Most are commodity. I think the iFixit teardown (See steps #15, 17 and 19) identified a number of manufacturers; Apple, TI, Broadcom, Fairchild, Qualcomm, Avago,Toshiba, Triquint, Skyworks... Hmmm. Let's see. What manufacturer's name is MISSING...?

Battery: Apple designed. No one else's battery comes close to size/capacity combination. Manufactured by Simplo Technology, with Dynapak International Technology as Apple's up-and-coming "preferred" source.

But don't let facts disturb your delusions...

The headline is misleading: Kodak first sued Apple just days before filing for bankruptcy. They tried to get an ITC ruling, which would have frozen Apple's sales. It looks like they were hoping Apple would quickly settle, and Kodak would use the money to stay afloat.

That didn't happen, so now Apple is suing back in retaliation, but before doing that they're asking the court for permission (which isn't necessary).

Here's more.

At the core of the dispute is a 2006 agreement in which Apple bought the iPad trademark from Taiwan's Proview Electronics for $55,000, by way of a front business known as IP Application Development. Proview says, though, that Apple didn't win the rights to the Chinese trademark, since those were owned by Proview Technology in Shenzhen, a subsidiary of the Hong Kong-based Proview International.

So it sounds like Apple perhaps fucked up and they didn't secure the rights in China like they thought they were, or the Taiwanese company deliberately misled them, waiting until they were in financial trouble to cash in this particular chip, and say "Surprise, you didn't buy the rights in China like you thought."

Whichever it is, I suspect it'd be easier and cheaper for Apple to simply buy the company and shutter it than it would be to pay 1.6 billion dollars and lose the right to use the name. Realistically, I think you can expect the companies to settle with Apple being granted the rights to the name, and Proview getting a nice chunk of cash for it.

We aren't talking about a fancy way to see haiku. We are talking about education. Would be great that education books work in educational devices, like i.e. the XO or other inexpensive ones, but this will only meant to be for Apple hardware. And that wouldnt be so bad per se, but we are talking about Apple here and odds are pretty high that they put a bunch of strategic patents around this, what could be abused forbidding any kind of educational ebook with more interactivity than turning pages.

Your statements are extremely loaded ones. They are like a slippery slope argument, except that you have skipped over the slippery slope entirely and simply found yourself at the bottom of the hill going "shit, that happened fast."

The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way.

I might agree with you.

We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything.

But then you lost me. For starters, can you provide some evidence that piracy is spiraling completely out of control? To be sure, the widespread adoption of the Internet and the increasingly quick download speeds were a boon to piracy, but I see no evidence that things are "spiraling out of control." If anything I think we're close to an equalibrium point.

Second, the idea that it is not lucrative to produce anything, or even that we may one day arrive at such a point, is so far-fetched that it is really not even worth addressing. Crap like Farmville and Maffia Wars are making a mint. Good, independent games like Magicka are too -- even when they are on nearly perpetual sale through avenues like Steam (which, by the way, the wider adoption of high-speed Internet also made possible). Modern Warfare 3 made over a billion dollars in two weeks. Battlefield 3 has sold eight million copies in its first month. Games like World of Warcraft keep on chugging, bringing in millions of dollars in subscription fees alone. If you want to claim people are only buying them because of the heavy multiplayer value, look no further than a game like Batman: Arkham City bringing in 1.5 million units in sales in its first month. There is no shortage of money to be made with decent games that people want, and if you think that is going to magically change then the onus is on you to prove it.

the fact they buy games as well as pirate them simply suggests that they like games so much that they acquire them by any means possible

Actually, I agree completely with you. A lot of piracy is a collector mentality. What I can't understand is why you start there and leap to some sort of need for technological means to censor the Internet. If these collector-types had to pay for every game they had, do you really think they would do so? I don't. They're going to pay for roughly the same amount of games as they did before, since that is obviously the point at which they have decided they can afford to purchase. The rest they will simply do without. You may consider that a win; "if you don't want to pay for it, you don't deserve it." In its own way, that's certainly fair enough. But when we have to enact legislation to protect that model, where nobody is being harmed to begin with and suddenly we have Internet censorship and life-destroying lawsuits flying around--not to mention the incredible costs of doing so, both to the publishers, the pirates, society as a whole and the opportunity costs of everything we're doing (Congress really has nothing better to debate for months? I thought our economy might be sucking, but I guess I'm wrong), I do not consider it to be a very good idea at all. Getting over the indignation and realizing they were never going to pay you for those games to begin with, now that is a good idea.

If the RIAA, MPAA et al wanted to increase their profits, that's easy: Reduce the prices. No, it will not eliminate piracy; nothing will, including these proposed laws (Piracy up in France despite three strikes law"). It will bring them more buyers. Piracy is, like almost everything else, at least partially a supply and demand issue, but publishers are unwilling to consider the idea that gambling on getting a huge chunk of an entertainment budget rather than virtually guaranteeing a s

What happens if the app store decides to disable your car, though?

They still do, but only at Microsoft Store grand openings.

Kindle Fire: $200.
Nook Color: $200
Nook Tablet: $250
Novo7: $100
Blackberry playbook: $199

Winning all the way to the poorhouse :

Motorola Mobility revenue misses, net loss narrows
Samsung phone sales drop 14%, profit drops 30%
HTC Is In Big Trouble: It Just Slashed Revenue Guidance Again

Just like PC vendors did under Windows' dominance.

That quote will go down in infamy as one of the most lamebrained and utterly wrong in history.

Followed by RIM's reaction to the initial iPhone announcement: They refused to believe it was real.

Desktop apps need not be signed. Metro apps must be signed by Microsoft. Tablets cannot run desktop apps.

ARM tablets can't, Intel ones can.

Also, this doesn't necessarily mean that third-party browsers will be barred from it. The reason why Apple bans them is because they have a rule where you cannot publish an app that competes with Apple products. Whether this will be a rule for Windows Store is yet to be seen; FWIW, Ballmer has said that "iTunes for Metro" would be okay, despite the fact that it would obviously be competing with WMP.

Shape and size? The natural results of designing a case around a screen, CPU, RAM, battery etc.

Don't forget that Apple actually lied in court by showing distorted images making the sizes look the same when they are quite different. The previously did the same thing with the Galaxy Samsung S phone so this is a well tried tactic by Apple

In its most recent quarter, Acer lost $234 million. Acer has no competitive tablet offering among the dozens of competing Android tablets. And of course the iPad is selling like mad with an expectation of 22 million units sold during the upcoming holiday quarter.

The Acer CEO is a dimwit who's talking smack because there's nothing else he can do to stem the tide of abject failure coming out of his factories. He is basically berating the customers for buying "hot" tablets, particularly the iPad, instead of buying the tried-and-true plastic Wintel units that Acer vomits up. His company bet big on low-margin netbooks and lost, and now he's betting on Intel "ultrabooks".

HP just bailed out of the entire PC business (echoing IBM's decision in 2004), and among the reasons was that the tablet effect is real.

The Acer CEO's effort is better focused on coming up with better products, not whining.

Great non-reply

So where it the clock cleaning at?

http://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/2011/07/19/apple-3q-earnings-revenue-shatter-expectations/

http://daringfireball.net/2011/07/ipad_dominance

iPads outsell Android tablets 20-1

http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/08/24/beats.out.likes.of.tiffany.whole.foods/
Apple retail highest sales per square foot

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9219467/Tight_supplies_push_up_prices_of_13_in._MacBook_Air?taxonomyId=76
Even the laptops are beating sales expectations

http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/08/24/could.give.apple.74.percent.of.tablet.market/
And shipping estimates for iPads are increasing

The facts don't support your claims, unless you have other magical facts that aren't in business reports.

Great non-reply

So where it the clock cleaning at?

http://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/2011/07/19/apple-3q-earnings-revenue-shatter-expectations/

http://daringfireball.net/2011/07/ipad_dominance

iPads outsell Android tablets 20-1

http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/08/24/beats.out.likes.of.tiffany.whole.foods/
Apple retail highest sales per square foot

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9219467/Tight_supplies_push_up_prices_of_13_in._MacBook_Air?taxonomyId=76
Even the laptops are beating sales expectations

http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/08/24/could.give.apple.74.percent.of.tablet.market/
And shipping estimates for iPads are increasing

The facts don't support your claims, unless you have other magical facts that aren't in business reports.

Ummm .. Android owning 56% of the smartphone market appears to be at least "approaching" the "getting their clock cleaned" - and a large percentage of that happened remarkably recently.

Last time I checked, the purpose of a publicly held company is to make money, not to chase market share. Apple currently makes 2/3 of all profits in cell-phones -- globally.

http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/07/29/asymco.shows.apple.at.two.thirds.of.mobile.income/

Try again:

"We are using compatibility as a club to make [Android vendors] do things we want." - Android manager Dan Morrill, email from August 6, 2010

Sure, here you go:

Google indefinitely withholds Android source from non-privileged partners

Google tries to suppress "highly confidential" Android source code in court case

Google memo admits they "use compatibility to make [Android vendors] do what we want"

Shall I go on, or are you and other fans going to robotically repeat the term "FUD" as if that somehow dismisses all facts?

Remember what the Galaxy Tab 10.1 looked like in February this year? It was fatter and it only somewhat looked like what Apple was doing.

And then... the iPad 2 came. You can tell that Samsung completely freaked out that it would lose to Apple, because it almost immediately said it "would not be outdone" by the iPad's new design:

http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/03/24/samsung.says.galaxy.tab.101.thinner.to.beat.ipad/

Yep. Samsung openly admitted that it was going to change the shape of its tablet because of the iPad 2, just two weeks after it had unveiled its own work. And sure enough, in March, the Galaxy Tab 10.1 was suddenly a lot thinner and looked remarkably much more like the iPad 2. I was at the CTIA's spring show, where they first showed off the remake: they even made it a source of pride how quickly they'd changed the look and had a glass case showing the old version and the new one.

I would personally keep the Galaxy Tab 10.1 on shelves because it's different enough, but there's no question that the model you see now wouldn't look the way it does if it weren't for Apple.

No, apple is suing samsung because they are working on android which is a competitor to iphone. What else do you call going for the ITC loophole and other anticompetitive moves ?

You don't hear apple saying shit about "Defending" anything. This is all claims of "Samsung stole from us" which = offensive = patent trolling. If it was "UI design lifting" it'd be a copyright lawsuit not a patent lawsuit.

This is not fucking difficult.

Wow really ? The guy that presided over a 14% drop in phone sales is in line to become CEO and is willing to piss of the biggest customer of the profitable part of business to do so ? Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Brazil has heavy tax in imported stuff, 35% on cars, almost 90% on electronics, so now the foxconn want to manufacture ipad in Brazil, so apple can reduce the price or increased the profits, the government don't care ( maybe a little bit), only care about the local jobs. And the Brazil government has a program to reduce even more the normal tax, it's passed a law to incentive the local manufacture of tablets and it's components. http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/05/24/tax.base.sacrificed.to.lure.foxconn.ipad.assembly/

How non-technical, and after how thorough of a look?

I'll just leave these here...

http://forums.macrumors.com/archive/index.php/t-297432.html
http://gigaom.com/2008/08/31/dont-like-the-iphone-check-out-these-touchscreen-phones/
http://www.gsmarena.com/newscomm-769.php
http://www.telecomasia.net/node/5199
http://www.google.com/search?q=SPH-1300&hl=en&prmd=ivns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=jjfATeTDOIL30gHT_tXuBA&ved=0CC4QsAQ&biw=1680&bih=947
http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_product=ET&p_theme=et&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_topdoc=1&p_text_direct-0=0EEF6B3EB0A8C768&p_field_direct-0=document_id&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&s_trackval=GooglePM
http://cgi.ebay.com/SPRINT-PCS-PALM-OS-WIRELESS-PHONE-SPH-1300-DUAL-BAND-/180613037497
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2000-09-25/news/18143226_1_cell-phone-palm-os
http://www.geardiary.com/2006/11/30/the-palm-treo-700p-palm-os-smartphone-review/
http://www.brighthand.com/default.asp?newsID=1690
http://www.gizmag.com/go/2306/
http://www.google.com/search?q=sony+p900
http://www.electronista.com/articles/08/10/13/lg.debuts.new.prada.phone/
http://www.esato.com/phones/compare.php?phone=433&cp=439
http://gizmodo.com/#!190670/cect-a1000-touchscreen-phone-with-1000-hours-standby
http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/at-t-8525/4505-6452_7-32133413.html?tag=lia;rcol

these aren't phones, but what the hell... they could still be mistaken for an iPhone at a glance...

http://welcome.hp.com/country/us/en/prodserv/handheld.html
http://www.suddenlink.net/pages/curtismc/palms.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palm_III

Was there even anything worth acquiring in this sale?

There was, but hopefully we dodged a bullet

I don't know where you are getting your numbers for 'every other market,' but in Europe at least, iOS is beating Android as far as I can tell.

Mods, if you want to mod me down, do it because you have data that shows I am wrong, not because your inner fanboy is coming out. And for the record, I prefer Android because it is open. But I care about data more.

The data you show indicates you didnt read the post you responded to or the data. It does NOT show iOS beating Android. Nor does it show Android beating iOS. It shows total numbers of owners of such devices during a 3 month period (which could easily have been a one day period and come up with the same results). Of course iOS will have larger numbers with it's multi-year head start. The title of that article, and the way they have the data labeled (with the "3 month" tag) makes an erroneous implication that the information is about sales during those 3 months. It is not. It's about installed base - which, as I said, could have simply been measured on the last day of those 3 months... but doing so, would not create the misleading impression it's given you (or probably countless others).

You should find a 3 month sales statistics breakdown if you really want to compare the two to see who is currently beating who in this market. From what I've seen (Comscore, Gartner, numerous others), in both the US and UK, it's Android for the win. That means, if that trend continues (not even counting the increase in sales curve for Android devices), Apple will eventually lose total overall marketshare to Android, their head start, notwithstanding. Check out this below if you don't understand what I am saying... (numbers entirely fictitious... it's simply pointing out the math, which should hopefully explain what I mean):

2007 iOS 100 - Android 0
2008 iOS 110 - Android 20
2009 iOS 120 - Android 50
2010 iOS 125 - Android 130
2011 iOS 125 - Android 140

In these made up figures, which parallel the events (if not the numbers), iOS is vastly ahead. If you do a "total number of iOS and Android users in the last 3 months), iOS wins. If you look at this year or last for sales during that time frame, Android wins. If things continue the same over the next few years, even assuming neither make gains in sales, then in a few years, Android takes the lead in total installed base as well.