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Android Hits 73% of Global Smartphone Market
eldavojohn writes "Gartner's released a report on worldwide numbers of 2012 3Q phone sales and the staggering results posted from Android have caused people like IW's Eric Zeman to call for sanity. Keep in mind these are worldwide numbers, which might be less surprising when you realize that the biggest growth market of them all is China, which is more than 90% Android. It's time to face the facts and realize that Android now owns 73% of the worldwide smartphone market. While developers bicker over which platform is best for development and earnings, the people of the world may be making the choice based on just how inexpensive an Android smartphone can be. This same time last year, Gartner reported Android at 52.5% of market share and it now sits at 72.4% market share with over 122 million units sold worldwide."
iPhone vs Android flamewar in 3, 2, ...
The # of phones shipped is very impressive. We are now in a smart-phone market where there is just iOS and Android: everyone else is in the noise.
But the # of phones is orthoginal to which a developer would want to target. How many purchases per phone are made on Android vs iOS? Whats the competition? How easy is the development model? How homogenious is the installed base?
All these question are the ones the developers are actually asking, and market share really doesn't come into play very much.
Test your net with Netalyzr
But BB10 is going to change everything!
I think that speaks more to how overpriced Apple products are. How do you think that they have $100 billion in cash?
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
As a developer, my first mobile product will be for Android and I'll do iOS second. My next upgrade will be from iOS to Android as I see lots of other following suit. Apple has been very accurate in shooting themselves in the foot recently with the iOS6 changes (like the new app store and the introduced artificial slowing down of the phone to make you upgrade) and a couple of minor gaffes like the maps, and at the same time charging premium for it.
I am aware of the markets right now on the Apple app store and the Google Play one, but since the latest app store changes to Apple it seems to be harder for new developers to be known and Apple is at the same time rigid with their criteria for app releases, while it seems it is easier to launch and release for Android. It seems Google Play has momentum now and I hope more game developers will make the move over to Android.
And AC's buy overpriced crap!
I wish all companies would take Levi's model. No trying on, no fucking around, just get the 510s I want and get the hell out.
3Q 2012 would have been when iOS was at it's lowest due to people waiting for the iPhone 5. You'll likely seem there temporarily be a large change in the numbers Q4, with them settling down to something in between Q1.
This happens once a year every year. The alternative would be believing that Apple suddenly lost half their share in one year, which also doesn't seem likely.
Not surprising that free software is so popular. Especially when it's the greedy manufacturers doing the shopping ;)
Not only is the software free, but the maintenance and upgrades are being handled for them too. Unless you have a big company pushing you to install their OS on it (MS) this is probably going to be your best choice.
Looking back at the considerable difficulty that MS has getting Windows to run smoothly on a wide variety of hardware, it's impressive to see just how well Android manages to support such a large variety of kit. Kudos to them for that.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
'coz the Steve Jobs effect is not over (yet). ...
But time will tell
This is true. Android/Windowz/BB/whoever are losers who don't know you need to pay a good chunk of change for a telephone. I'm proud that my rugged industrial case has a giant hole in the back just so the Apple logo shows through. It allows people to see that I'm awesome without having to waste my time talking to these idiots. Apple needs to litigate their competitors(copiers) out of the market. Apple invented the smartphone, it's their pie. Stop eating out of it.
So buy a Nexus device and Flash whatever OS you want onto it. This is as close as you can get. Qualcomm will kill any dreams you have of fully-open.
This is a total re-play of the IBM/Apple race for PC market. Google is the IBM in this scenario. Next logical prediction would be Apple is going into crisis in a few years and looks for a new Steve Jobs to come up with something new entirely for which another competitor will play the IBM card.
Just get an android and compile your os with exactly what you want...
I think that speaks more to how overpriced Apple products are. How do you think that they have $100 billion in cash?
Not really. I think it speaks to the nature of the market Apple sells into. The iPhone is similarly priced to phones like the Galaxy SIII and other top tier Android handsets, but the 73% of global marketshare is certainly not all phones of the SIII's calibre - there are going to be a lot of much cheaper phones in there (Samsung itself sells a cheaper baby brother version of the S-class).
Apple makes the bulk of the cash because it focuses on a small slice of the market, with a highly tuned product (ie, with few options) and in certain markets (such as the US) accounts for 40% or more of the market with that small line.
They have $100 billion in cash because they've been sitting on it it for some time not paying dividends (although they do now), and having multiple highly profitable product lines since the launch of the original iMac.
The fact remains, that the iPhone costs almost the same as a top Android handset. It costs *a lot* more than the average Android handset price though... but so does the SIII.
"According to an IDC press release issued just last week, Samsung sold 2,391,000 tablet computers worldwide in Q2 2012, up 117.6% from the same quarter last year. According to Samsung’s court filing, it sold a total of 37,000 tablets in the U.S. last quarter, down 86% year over year."
You do realise that America is not actually the whole world, right?
Android comes in so many different varieties. I need a slideout keyboard - no problem, lots of choices. iPhone? Forget about it - one size is supposed to fit all. Need a stylus? Nope. Need a bigger screen? Nope. Smaller screen? Nope. Multiple physical keys? Nope. Add a Micro SD card? Nope. NFC? Nope. FM radio chip? Nope. No choice = smaller sales.
I paid $25 for mine. It makes phone calls and sends and receives texts. I'm still trying to figure out what else would be worth paying hundreds of dollars more for a bigger phone with a shorter battery life.
Oh, I guess I could post Facebook status updates from the bus. Yeah.
More like show off the wedding tackle. How anyone can stand such tight pants I will never understand.
iOS apps make me more than my Android apps. One primary reason is iOS users actually use their devices far more than Android users.
http://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=9&qpcustomb=1
Fact is most Android phones are the low-price, low-margin variety that are used almost exclusively for texting.
You could also post shitty Slashdot comments from the bus.
That's got to be worth something...
You could also post shitty Slashdot comments from the bus.
That is a tempting argument.
How long would you continue manufacturing a product, if there were no profit in it?
If you are willing to work for free, of course, I would be happy to employ you for long hours.
A lot of the growth is in China. For many, this will be their only computing device. Android has 90% in China.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
wait till the Lumia 1120 gets released in 2017 - THAT will be the game-changer.
The fact remains, that the iPhone costs almost the same as a top Android handset. It costs *a lot* more than the average Android handset price though... but so does the SIII.
Well, like any market with high end offerings and low end offerings, the high end is making up for the thin margins at the low end. If Generic Android Handset Free with 2 Year Contract wasn't sold at cost to the cell providers, there would be no need to inflate the price on the high end to cover development.
Apple doesn't really make a low end anything. Even the iPod Shuffle and Mac Mini are not positioned as competition against commodity mp3 players and cheap PCs.
More Twoson than Cupertino
If you were a teenage girl, that would be easily worth $600 - of someone else's money!
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
Because you can give you app away for free and monetize ads and tracking data?
More Twoson than Cupertino
> whining about Apple's dividends
Why don't you let me know when Google starts paying a dividend, ok fuckwit.
Whining? What?
Point out where I was whining about dividends one way or the other. Quote the exact text, not just your interpretation of what you think I mean. That's not how quoting works.
Also, you should probably log in.
Android users are poor and can't afford apps. Hence, they also can't afford a nice smart phone and go for the cheapest Android POS they can get.
Why would a developer target that segment?
WalMart shoppers are poor and can not afford expensive stuff. Yet, somehow, WalMart made a shitload of money. Sell to the masses and eat with the classes. (I think Henry Ford was one of the first to use this widely.)
As a developer, I have to say that I develop for iOS first. There are many reasons for this (I actually like Android better for personal use).
The fragmentation of the Android platform is ridiculous. Not only do you have to worry about processors, screen ratio, resolution and anything else hardware related... you also have to worry about fragmentation of the operating system. Some people might have gingerbread and haven't upgraded to ice cream sandwich yet. And perhaps their phone can't handle the newest version. On top of that users may not have enough technical knowledge to fix it.
This results in consumers blaming your product. It doesn't work on their phone, this app sucks, the company sucks, etc.
However, releasing on iOS... you only have to worry about a couple of configurations of phone (you can even stipulate that your app only works on 3GS or 4 and above or whatever) and a few different screen ratios/resolutions. It's even okay to force the user to upgrade to the latest version of iOS. Which is simple to do.
This results in people (hopefully) enjoying your app and getting your company and products a fan base. Then when you port it to Android... if the app doesn't work on their phone and they do a search they'll find good reviews, testimonials, etc and blame their phone instead of the developer.
Get what right? Nothing in that post said anything about how many tablets the analysts claimed they'd sold in America.
...Windows on the smartphone.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Now that Android is having this kind of marketshare, especially in the East, where they are laisse-faire about installing software of suspect provenance. Now what is the malware scenario in smart phones? Android much worse than its competitors on the security front?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
And for years the Ford Taurus was the best selling car. And the F150 series the biggest selling vehicle on the planet. What are these numbers supposed to say? Especially when the vast majority of those phones are still running 2.something and can't even run things target for the newer.
My friends in China are not "hipsters" who want the most popular item, nor are they "cheap". They want cool new functionality - the latest cutting edge stuff. Not going to find it on any other platform except Android right now.
Walmart profits on necessity spending. How many cell phone apps fall into that category?
and 73% of worldwide does not spell "THRIVE" to you?
When the run rate increases 100% a year, the last year's sales equate to a considerable fraction of the installed base. Like half. Right now iOS and Android are about even on installed base. With Android outselling iOS 5 to 1, if it stays at that ratio then this time next year the iOS fraction of the installed base will be considerably smaller - especially since its older installed base means a larger percentage of its products are retired from use each year.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Given how many "manufacturers" of smartphones I saw at CES this year. They're almost all the same. They look like they came from the same factory with different trims. The one major difference was the MIPS based ones. Generally, the phones were very cheap, in lots of 500s they were about $135. I would pick up a couple of them for traveling since they were generally GSM unlocked.
Some of the "Google's Android TV" you could get at $45/unit for lots of 100s.
No, he's not.
The S3 costs about the same, but is a lot higher speced (read: more expensive to make). Much larger screen, NFC, more RAM, more CPU power, more expansion slots, etc.
For a lot of people none of that matters (and for a lot it matters), but it does increase the cost per unit.
Let's say I'm going to spend the next 6 months build an app. Where do I put my energy? As the article says, most of the growth is in China. That's awesome for the Chinese people, awesome for the open source ecosystem, awesome for Google, and awesome for the handset manufacturers who are making those devices. For app producers, however, it's irrelevant if that marketshare doesn't reflect sales. Even if iOS becomes niche (which I think is likely), it seems to be the best place to put make investment.
I do think the development story is improving with Google Play and Amazon/BN's proprietary stores, but I believe that most devices making up the bulk of the Android market share are low end devices without those marketplaces. (Play is *not* part of the operating system) The more I think about it, I think iOS vs. Android matters less than Apple AppStore installs/instances vs. Google Play vs. (other app stores)
The best thing about a boolean is even if you are wrong, you are only off by a bit.
Walmart profits on necessity spending. How many cell phone apps fall into that category?
Google Maps for the new iPhone comes to mind.
Guessing math isn't your strong point, but take all of the Android 'sales', and instead of splitting them across some 50, 100, or 150 companies, but all of that profit back into a single company.
Apple also doesn't compete in the low end. They sell high end and have much higher profit margins.
Apparently lobbing cartoon birds at pictures of pigs is worth paying an extra $200 or more.
I don't get it either.
As tempting as any I've heard, and I'm not kidding. Of course, you'd have to ride a bus.
So it's the "Year of Linux on the Dock"?
Congratulations on your math+logic fail. Last I saw, Apple makes about 3/4 of the smartphone profits, Samsung makes most of the rest, HTC makes like 1%, and the rest lose money. BUT THESE ARE PERCENTAGES, and all but one of their competitors are not making ANY profit AT ALL. Apple could be making fifty cents per phone and still get 3/4 of the profits against these losers.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
True, I'm not involved in advertising. But why then is anyone still giving anything away? If there was so little money, clearly the number of apps overall should be contracting, wouldn't it?
More Twoson than Cupertino
Actually, a 64GB iP5 is about twice as expensive as a 64GB GS3, thanks the SD cards' lower price. There's a wide gap at 32GB too.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
Yep, I'm betting in 5 years Android will be more like 90% of the market. Something about Apple, Jobs, PR, and it's image of late make me suspect so.
The Android market is split in 2: the flagship market and the budget market. There is very limited choice on the flagship market. The budget market comes however in all shapes, form, price point, but brand support is unpredictable. You can get a phone that will be supported for years, and another that will be forgotten after a few months.
The high end market in which Apple compete was mostly unoriginal and expensive. I said "was" because Google just crashed the party with the Nexus 4, a high end phone from a reputable brand at very competitive price. That will be interesting to see how Apple, but also HTC, Sony, Samsung, LG will manage to justify a 100% premium. Worst case scenario, they will just align the price. Personally I hope they will innovate. Since the original iPhone in 2007, there hasn't been much innovation (larger, faster, thinner, widget on the lock screen, ... are improvements, very important that you could not live without and some that required great engineering innovation, but since the original iPhone nothing has created the same wow factor )
Yep, I'm betting in 5 years Android will be more like 90% of the market.
Egads! I hope the EU courts don't force them to install Internet Explorer or Safari for being a monopoly.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
If you have ad-supported free apps on the market, don't you think more eyeballs would be better?
At some point the developers will stop and realize there's a whole lot of people in the other ecosystem.
We already know there are more people that have Android devices.
How many buy apps though? How many even have Android devices where it is practical to have apps?
I am technically one of the "Android Users". I have a cheap Android phone I bought for international use when I was there for an extended period (which ended up being a debacle because it turns out devices are actually usually carrier locked TO A COUNTRY in the EU instead of being able to use any SIM).
But the Android device I have, is not something I would ever buy apps for. The screen is too small, the touch screen too annoying. I'd use maps on it and that's about it.
How many other Android devices are around that people will use as feature-enhanced dumb phones? That's not something that ever gets talked about. And yet judging by the substantial revenue lead iOS development still holds over Android, that has to be a substantial portion of devices.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It is also their strength. Apple have always preferred a tight product line up and fewer sales at high margins. That is their business model. It was nearly by accident that the iPod and iPhone got so massively popular.
They still sell fuckloads of phones and make exceptional profits.
Really?
Apple's profits have been dropping like a stone, they've been suing android for that reason - and you assume that android growth doesn't = profit?
might want to go back to economics 101 - he who sells the most is going to find a way to profit more.
Look at how google's revenue has been, and how every smartphone manufacturer's revenue has been. Record revenue over the last 5 years? check.
As a developer, my first mobile product will be for Android and I'll do iOS second.
Why you would want to make less money is beyond me, but I thank you for reducing competition in the app store.
like the new app store and the introduced artificial slowing down of the phone to make you upgrade
iOS 6 runs great on my 3GS, better than iOS5 did.
The new app store is only a problem for those who cannot market. If you were only ever relying on searches finding your app you were pretty well screwed anyway.
Apple is at the same time rigid with their criteria for app releases, while it seems it is easier to launch and release for Android.
That is the one area Android has advantage in, quicker releases. But I'm not sure that's a user benefit as much as it is a developer benefit.
It seems Google Play has momentum now
Nope, Amazon app store has momentum (on Android)
I hope more game developers will make the move over to AndroidI hope more game developers will make the move over to Android
I thought pretty much all of them already were, since most are using frameworks like Unity that are cross platform.
Unless they didn't want the support costs and piracy problems...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Since Nokia makes about -10% of the smartphone profits, the numbers are going to be a little skewed. Nokia is currently the champion of losing money in smartphones, at about $1B losses per quarter. And they don't make Android phones.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
So Walmart has stopped selling movies? video games? toys? cosmetics? junk food? electronics? photo services?
Sure Walmart makes a lot money selling clothing & food, but they also make a tidy profit on non-necessities.
I would if most of those were at a current OS version. Hell even 4.0... but 90% are still at nothing higher than 2.3.5 and that is utter crap.
I love my Nexus, but I feel really bad for peopel that bought a phone from a crap maker that will not push out updates in a timely manner.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
And the S3 does not run Android 4.2 unlike my $299 Nexus... Making my Nexus superior to the SIII in every way.... right now.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Maybe not but considering I have something that replaces a laptop, gps and an aircard in my pocket in a pinch is kinda nice. Not to mention I'd be paying another hundred for a MP3 player that is now just part of my phone.... Yeah, it is worth 200 to me.
Ok, so it's not for you but don't act like gaming is the only thing that can be done on a smartphone. I guess it shows more about the kind of person that you are than the smartphone owner.
Take a look at the report. Apple grew from 3.9% of all phones sold to 5.5% with sales growth from 17.2m to 22.6m. I'm having a tough time seeing why Apple fans should be worried.
All those rationalizations and excuses, sounds quite a bit like Republicans on the last election.
It sure seems like Android users are the ones inflating figures when in real life developers still make far more money off iOS development. Keep pushing out those polls, er, stats claiming you are "winning".
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Apple's profits have been dropping like a stone? What planet do you live on?
http://static5.businessinsider.com/image/500dafd46bb3f71002000002-960/chart-of-the-day-apples-real-earnings-expectations-july-2012.jpg
Congratulations on your math+logic fail.
So, you're paying more to the company than the hardware is worth and getting less for it than, say, a Galaxy S3 user, and you congratulate *others* on their "math+logic fail"?
Are you a Poe? If so, well played.
As a customer, I really don't give a shit how profitable a company is for their shareholders as long as they can stay in business and keep serving my needs.
--Jeremy
Jesus was a liberal
Already 90% in the biggest growth market, China. Now even Paul Thurrot is calling Android "The new Windows".
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Apple sells slightly above average products at high end prices, and that is why they have much higher profit margins.
Oh my hell, you Apple fanbois are in so much denial. It's because of China? Really?
Don't forget to mention some totally irrelevent fact like "Oh yeah, but most of those phones aren't running the latest version althoughactuallyios6ononeiphoneisntthesameasios6onanother!" or "Well I'm a developer and iOS makes me so much more money I stopped even bothering to support Android a few years ago andhavenoideawhatthesituationwouldbeifididsupportitnow."
Here's the deal: Android is leading the way making smartphones available to everyone. Proper smartphones. Y'know, that conform to the original definition before Jobs changed it to "A phone with a PDA built-in that the manufacturer has complete control over."
I think that's fantastic. I have issues with modern smartphones, not least the stupid battery lives, but I think it's great that such a fantasticly useful tool is in the hands of almost everyone these days. That's worth celebrating. If you happen to like some rival to Android, and the figures don't seem to suggest that they're the ones putting smartphones in people's hands, take it up with them. Stop dissing the one group that's got it right.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Give me a fully-functional, fully-OPEN, miniature computer in the format of a phone, not tied to FUCKING Google, Apple, Microsoft, or any other multinational company of liars.
I believe what you're referring to is a dumb phone.
Whenever a player quits EVE to go play WoW, the Average IQ of both games increase.
Have you ever been in a Walmart?
It's a real stretch to call anything they sell "necessary".
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
I think it's pretty damn cool.
I mean, that the mainstream avg person sees linux as the OS for nerdy, contrarian, anti-establishment type peoples (ie, Linux) and it now become itself mainstream in that it basically runs the cell phone world (yes i know linux servers have runt he net for years...but thats not mainstream)
And then it gets even cooler when you consider that iOS, still with the same familiar looks Apple has long been known for, is derived from Unix (via OSX).
Flamewar? Bah. Just a bit of sibling rivalry as they curb stomp Windows into oblivion in the largest/quickest growing platform market.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
but 90% are still at nothing higher than 2.3.5
Actually, Gingerbread and below are down to about 70%. Not good (JB is only on an utterly pitiful number of devices), but improving slowly.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
Doesn't significant profit indicate that their products are priced correctly?
Consumers can be suckers, they can easily be fooled to pay much more in order to get what they want or think they need or is hip, in fashion, status symbol, etc.. I do it all the time.
But they are not completely idiots and they hate evil empires. And that's what Apple is becoming. All those lawsuits and control Apple is trying to have over its devices is coming back to bite them.
I was one of the first to buy the iPhone 3 and then the iPhone 4. And although I was in time for upgrade skipped 5, and will go for nexus 4 instead. Same in the laptop front, I won't be spending any dollars for Apple products any time soon.
Soon every TV will have android in it.
And if the camera makers got of their ass, android would be great in a DSLR, now if they just gave every DSLR bt/gps/wifi/3g, then it would rock. Come on makers, put in that $20 soc in there.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Price is just another choice offered by Android.
You need to actually use a galaxy S3 before calling Samsung a copy cat. The machine they give you is so far ahead of the iPhone its unbelievable! I have had all of the iPhones except the 5 and I can tell you that the actual functionality of the S3 is at least six years ahead. The only thing the iPhone does better than Android on the S3 is sync with iTunes on a Mac. Fortunately I donneed to sync with iTunes any more. Im starting to wish Id bought an Android tablet now even though I still like my iPad.
I do think the iPhone looks nice though,
Ya... about that... let's keep that deduction to a sales #s only type thing.
Let me explain this to you so it's easy to grasp. You make a thing, you set a price that allows you to recoup costs and make a product, and you put it on the market. Your thing either sells or it doesn't. If it doesn't sell, you either change the product, change your price, or kill it. If your thing sells at the price you set, you make money and stay in business. If your thing sells well, or sells at a rate that makes it difficult for you to fill demand, FOR A FACT, your device is not overpriced. Feel free to proceed to reference Apple's VooDoo marketing and brainwashed Apple zealots or whatever other standard tropes you employ to allow you to refuse to accept that Apple is really good at this "capitalism" thing.
Fiat Homos et Pereat Theos
Microsoft didn't get rich until AFTER it cornered the market. This is a song Apple has sung before.
You have just said that Apple and the S3 are of a similar price and that Apple make a lot more money. It seems to me that would suggest that Apple are giving you much less for the same price.
I think that is true.
Even if on paper the phone is zero profit, the profit was made since samsung also make the nand/ram chips, cpu + lcd and bits , 75% of the hardware.
Apple HAS to purchase its parts from Samsung and LG.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Personally, I manage two businesses with mine. I keep track of 6 email accounts, four bank accounts, phone calls and realtime chat. I use Skype on my phone about an hour a day to talk to friends and coworkers outside the country. Just that alone has saved me almost $1000 this year on what used to be annoying phone cards and/or exorbitant international calling rates.
And I can do all of this on my phone, so I was able to take a vacation last week to visit an old friend, without actually being completely unavailable and/or hiring someone to pick up the slack. We went on a hike, even though I knew I had an important client meeting to handle and I took 15 minutes at the top of a mountain to finish the meeting, send out an updated projections spreadsheet and book a flight.
Oh yeah, I keep in touch with my sister and we play scrabble with an app. I can enter expense reports and I regularly check transit schedules and driving directions on the phone while I'm on my way to see a client. Then I can email them and let them know an exact ETA as I'm en route.
Or... maybe your life isn't very interesting and you can simply sit at home and handle all of these tasks on your desktop PC. I prefer to go for a hike...
Mine ran a Nexus 4.2 ROM for a while. I didnt really like it as much as the TouchWiz interface for the S3 so went back (almost. I actually run Omega now which is the Stock Samsung with a few tweaks and fancy things)
Actually the total market has ceases growing for now, and it is simply replacing feature phones. Total subscribers is down 3 percent. The only segment growing is smartphones.
Apple has a huge install base. Its easy for them to make 5 million phones, and sell out in the first month.
Makes good headlines. As long as you don't look closely and notice that Samsung sold 30 million in the comparable period. Without selling out.
I agree that apple makes nice hardware. Not the best by far.
The iphone UI needs a total makeover. And this whole mentality that you pretty much need a computer to own an iPhone has got to go.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
The usages of my Samsung Note 2 are:
Play music: 70%
Play video games while in the bus, train etc: 10%
Record videos of my little daughter to share with relatives: 5%
Google chat and SMS: 5%
Read personal mail at work: 5%
Phone calls are somewhere in the remaining 5%
Oh, and while on holidays it's invaluable to have a GPS navigation device that allows you to click right through to the website of the hotel you found on the overlaid map and yes, call them to reserve a room for the night.
And the GPS + satellite photo maps have saved me from getting badly lost in a forest at least once, and kept me from being late while taking a picturesque route to a rendez-vous another time. Maps-on-demand that include your location are a god-given when you're traveling, hiking, etc.
Try any that with a brick phone.
Looks like 2012 was the year of Linux on the phone then.
Is Linux on my Android phone? The terminal emulator app seems to think so:
u0_a39@android:/ $ uname -a
Linux localhost 3.0.31-cyanogenmod-g7556d0b #1 SMP PREEMPT Tue Nov 13 06:45:01 PST 2012 armv7l GNU/Linux
- it does not mean what you think it does.
Dude, the hardware is getting better, and pretty soon, the bottom lowest piece of crap, will have 1024 or 1280 screens, will have min 1ghz dual core, will have at least 4gig flash. All for $50.
Todays $50 phones beat the $300 phones of 2010.
But I do agree LG make too many phones, just make 3-4 great ones, not 50, http://www.gsmarena.com/lg-phones-20.php
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Lets say you are right and most of the Android market share comes from Chinese and Indian users. That implies Apple's market share is bigger in the US, Europe and Australia. So be it. Then Apple as the bigger market share in declining societies, while new new kids on the block use Android. China alone has more potential buyers than all these First World regions together. No one cares if Apple has great sales in that tiny winy market of the US and Europe.
However, when I look around. A lot of people here in Germany buy themselves Android phones. Especially iPhone users who want more value and less restrictions on their phone. Even though they find the Android phones less intuitive than the iPhone.
My existing music and podcasts are a significant barrier to me switching. I'm a relatively happy iPhone user, but would be open to switching for a phenomenal device.
The music is a dealbreaker though. I have enough in music and podcasts to leave my 64GB nearly full, so converting them by CD isn't an option.
Anyone have a good solution here?
But wait! I thought the iPhone was the most popular phone on the market? You mean to tell me Apple skews their market stats by only having one model of phone? When did they start doing that? oh wait... iPod... iBook... iMac... damn, I sense a trend...
Really?
Apple's profits have been dropping like a stone, they've been suing android for that reason - and you assume that android growth doesn't = profit?
might want to go back to economics 101 - he who sells the most is going to find a way to profit more.
Look at how google's revenue has been, and how every smartphone manufacturer's revenue has been. Record revenue over the last 5 years? check.
Speaking of going back to Econ 101 - you might want to review the little fact that revenue does not equal profits.
He who sells the most will profit more? You sell 100 widgets at $10/unit with a manufacturing cost of $9/unit resulting in $1 profit/unit, for a total profit of $100. I sell 10 widgets at $50/unit with a manufacturing cost of $35/unit resulting in $15 profit/unit for a total profit of $150. Who's profiting more in this scenario?
You could be using it to make apps for sale to people with equally expensive phones!
If it was that simple, Nokia should have been the undisputed ruler of the mobile market since my impression is they put out a dozen models in markets others put out two. Apple might be a little over the top in the other direction but it's easier for developers to only support a few models and customers know each model is popular enough every application will usually work well, both ways have their pros and cons. Of all the choices you don't get with Apple the most obvious is a cheap model. My local price comparison lists 171 cell phone models with a price, sorted from low to high the first Apple model is the iPhone 4 (8 GB) on 128th while the iPhone 5 is 166th, 169th and 171st - the most expensive phone you can buy. Ferrari only produces four models too, but I doubt that's why their market share is low...
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
and having multiple highly profitable product lines
Right. They have lots of cash because of their profits. But somehow you think that making lots of profits doesn't mean their stuff is overpriced.
I know you're trying to be sarcastic, but... yes?
Just because a company is profitable does not automatically mean their products are overpriced. Correlation does not necessarily equal causation, as slashdot is often very quick to point out.
Somehow slashdot seems to have a mental break when it comes to Apple for some reason.
Why? I'm pretty sure Android can play regular AAC audio files. Unless you still have music bought more than a few years ago, in which case upgrading them to "iTunes Plus" will remove DRM and upgrade them to 256kbps at the same time.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
Not everyone needs a $600 smartphone, and it's an oversight on Apple's part.
Not an oversight. They chose to give up on that 47%. They will never buy Apple stuff anyway.
Don't confuse policy/politics with business. In politics, you need to get 50% of your "market" or you lose. Plus you only get to play every 2/3/4/5 years (depending on your "market").
Not so in business, even targeting a solid 15-20% of the market that's high-margin is often considered a solid plan. e.g.: BMW they clearly don't compete with Toyota or GM for marketshare, yet have a thriving, highly profitable business and a stellar brand. Same with Apple in desktop computing.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
I have rather a lot of iTunes music and some audio books. Fortunately, they are stored in a format that Android has no problems playing so you either
a) Drag and drop all your music into a folder on your phone (or sd-card) and the music apps will find them. You MAY need to run an app to re-get all your album art back again or
b) If you are on Windows and have an S3, use the supplied to software to sync like you always did on the iPhone.
For some reason, on a Mac, Samsungs Kies software is appalling and in the end I first bought a cheap app called SyncMate that did syncing like I was used to (although it also presented the phone as a hard drive on my mac) and finally realised that the whole syncing thing is nonsense and copying stuff is much more convenient.
Now, of course, I use rsync or scp as its not only faster, its more fun :)
Yeah, but Walmart had a net income last year of 15.7 billion. While Apple had a net income of 41 billion. Even though Walmart has almost 3 times the revenue (447 billion vs 156) I know which company I'd rather be working for, or in charge of, or have stock in. Sure Walmart makes a large sum of money, and they're profitable, but they expend an awful lot of energy to get that done. Walmart has 2.2 million employees, Apple, only 72 thousand. All my numbers are from Wikipedia (Walmart Apple).
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
Like a soup kitchen bragging about how good it is by how many come through its doors !!
So just eat, eat, eat it !! Why don't you eat it !!
McDonald's has served billions, does that mean McDonald's makes the best food?
Internet explorer has the largest market share too, is IE the best browser?
Largest market share does not mean the product is the best, many things could influence that number. For example, iPhone 5 is not available in china, so no surprise that android has over 90% market share in China. The largest carrier in china, china mobile, doesn't even offer iPhone.
I think if they had a graph of just US market share iOS would be doing much better.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
Suck on what? The low end Android little-better-than-feature phones that will be swelling the landfills, or the inability of this market share to translate into a meaningful profit for anyone but the Apple copycat Samsung?
Help us out here. Because if anyone out there think Android's market share success is analogous to Microsoft's Windows market share, you are sadly mistaken.
Yup, apparently Microsoft's 90% PC OS market share is a 'harmful monopoly', Google's having 73% smartphone OS market represents a product that is 'thriving'. It is absolutely surreal to watch how our local brigade of flying Google monkeys flips from heaping scorn on the Windows monoculture to singing the praises of what is becoming an Android monoculture. Microsoft has such a huge market share because they make a product people are satisfied with... OK... Windows 7 isn't the Bugatti Veyron of PC OSes, it's more of a pimped up Ford Fiesta, but it does what people need it to which makes it a good product. Nobody forces people to use Windows, anymore than somebody forces people to use Android. In fact you could make the case that people have more choice with Windows PCs. They can actually replace Windows with Linux fairly easily and get software for free (although for some strange reason most still prefer to keep windows and shell out money for proprietary Windows software). You can't install another OS on your Samsung Galaxy anything the ease that can replace Windows 7 with Linux. Unlike that Windows PC, with a smartphone you are stuck with the pre-installed OS it comes with. However, even though people buy Windows PCs and Android smart phones because they are generally satisfied with these devices it does not mean that either monoculture is good for the industry or that these monocultures don't stifle innovation.
"I'm still trying to figure out what else would be worth paying hundreds of dollars more for a bigger phone with a shorter battery life."
Navigation, POI (business search), and live traffic information is worth vastly more than $100 by itself.
Listening to your entire music collection and/or live streaming like Pandora and PRI/NPR/BBC World.
Watching youtube videos, or entire DVDs if you are so inclined (works out well on long flights).
Reading and replying to your personal and work email wherever and whenever you feel like it.
Having both your personal appointments and reminders, and your work appointments pulled from Exchange automatically.
Using a good RSS reader, allowing you to read the articles from a number of website you frequent (including /.) all in a slick interface, at a moment's notice, without needing to turn on/off a computer.
Replying to idiots on /. at work...
Having all your ebooks wherever you are, and a great screen to read them on.
Having a great SSH client wherver you are, so you can login to your Linux boxes and do... absoloutely anything and everything...
Scientific calculator with you at all times.
All the games you can stand... From strategy games to word games, to emulators allowing you to play any game for older consoles (Genesis, N64, etc).
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Well of course you are right in nearly everything you have said :)
However, I would vigorously dispute your last sentence. I have an iPhone sitting here right next to my S3. Putting them side by side, there are only two things that strike me as being "pros" for the iPhone. 1) It looks nice. 2) It syncs better with Itunes on a Mac. Other than that, I really struggle to think of anything that is not considerably better on the S3. I have 3 Macs, I have two iPads and all the iPhones except 5 so Im not exactly an Apple hater but this S3 has rather opened my eyes to what the rest of the world has been doing while Ive been playing with my iPhone all these years,
Even though Walmart has almost 3 times the revenue (447 billion vs 156) I know which company I'd rather be working for, or in charge of, or have stock in.
I suspect you haven't looked at AAPL's stock price recently.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
I have an Original Droid Incredible by HTC. The phone has a flaw which means a very small amount of space is allowed for apps to store data in even though you can upgrade the actual memory. In other words, adding an 8GB flash means that you still can't have more apps. So I did some creative hacking to "fix" this problem and now I cannot get OTA updates. I'm stuck on Android 2.2. However, I wouldn't call it utter crap. I can run every app I've tried to run with the exception of one. That one app is Microsoft SmartGlass. Other then that, 2.2 still does everything I want it to do and that's pretty awesome.
We''l the one thing the SIII copies from Apple is it being closed up more than older Android software. I've noticed this starting from ICS on. I just don't like being charged double for 32 gig of memory when I could probably pay +/- $20 for a 32 gig vs. a 16 gig card at Amazon.
Other than that I have messed with an SIII and it is great BUT I own an LG Optimus with 2.2.2 on it and new apps still work just fine. A 4.3" screen vs. a 4.8". A 1.0 ghz dual core vs. a 1.5 ghz dual core in the SIII (in the US){I think it has a Quad core in other countries}. Mine has HDMI out with a cable. I dunno how to that with an SIII. The 2) 3D cameras on an Optimus and no camera button sucks a little.
BUT you are correct. Apple's insistence on making their phones out of aluminum instead of good ole injection molded plastic is good in theory but not in practice. This makes them slower to change in the long run.
Already 90% in the biggest growth market, China. Now even Paul Thurrot is calling Android "The new Windows"
It's even mimicking having the old versions refuse to die, and relatively recent releases not supported! I work at a company who does software development for mobile phones and we release software targeting Android 2.2 (think Windows XP and/or IE6) simply because the vast fragmentation present (like Windows/IE).
Man blir trött av att gå och göra ingenting.
except that your scale is incredibly off.
The reality is that in your 50:1 implied scenario you miss the fact that in reality it might be a 3:1 with apple: android profits, while android is easily selling far more than 3:1.
Simply having giant margins doesn't mean giant profits, but it does mean that you're far more susceptible to a drop in demand.
I keep hearing people talk about wanting (or worse, "needing") a stylus. Handheld devices have had styli for decades now. They sucked then and they suck now: slow you down, easy to lose, etc. Phone keyboards? The same: phones have had them for decades. They sucked then and they suck now. That's why the iPhone was such a big hit: no stylus, no keyboard. Bigger screen? Something of an acquired taste for those who spend a lot of time away from a laptop/tablet/home.
I just don't see those things adding a lot of sales. Mostly, it's that Android phones are cheaper: Google gives the OS away so that it can spy more effectively on you -- Google makes all of its money from selling information about you, not making products -- and what manufacturer and carrier don't like free and don't want to mess with the user experience? Apple has bravely fought the carriers, who screwed up cellphone interfaces for decades, but Google doesn't really care about that issue, since it doesn't actually market to end users.
So it boils down to price (cheap) and carrier control and I'd say that affects world-wide sales a LOT more than people who want to step back two decades to physical keyboards or styli.
Maybe you haven't used the S3 enough because everyone I know that has also has a dead battery. The iPhone 5 might be better or worse any number of things, but the thing that matters most to me is that I can actually use it all day.
Mod parent Troll, but...
How could someone with such a low uid be prone to such hyperbole? Six years ahead, in a genre of devices that is not even six years old?
I dont seem to have that much of a problem but I would agree that as I am constantly using it for stuff, the battery is perhaps a little worse than I am used to. For some reason it loses a few percent while idle. However it hasnt actually run out on me during the day and if it did Id pop in a spare battery. Never did that on the iPhone though .... oh wait!
How much of the 20% jump was due to the fact that the iPhone 5 hadn't been released for most of the quarter, and still hasn't in much of the world.
Actually, quite the reverse. A poorly designed application is trivial to deploy for either platform, and results in a terrible experience on both. A properly designed one is much much much harder to deploy on both.
Actually you both would do well to do a little refresher on economies of scale. More is always better - your cost per unit eventually starts going back up.
The iPhone is similarly priced to phones like the Galaxy SIII and other top tier Android handsets,
And yet the iPhone 5 is a major downgrade in hardware save for the aluminium construction. Both you and the GP are right though in different ways. The iPhone is definitely sold at a huge premium. I haven't found a hard number for the Galaxy SIII but for the most part I can only find references to the Galaxy SIII being more expensive to manufacture. Rightfully so too given it's bigger screen, better processor, extra features like NFC, etc. Apple really do fleece their customers, especially those who buy overpriced accessories and Applecare.
On the market though you have a point too. It takes a certain type of market to buy into products that are a worse experience, cost more, and yet have a queue of dedicated fans who will camp in front of an Apple store on product release date. Two bits of this market interest me. Firstly was that one person at our local Apple store who was offered $1000 to give up their first in line spot at the Apple store by a radio station, and said no... Secondly that the product they were standing in line for thinks that the city of Cairns (where the solar eclipse was) is north of Port Douglas in the middle of a rainforrest nature reserve.
This kind of market is something companies can only dream of building. A market which can repeatedly be screwed, overcharged, and yet line up all night to say thanks sir may I have another.
I hope for Apple's sake though this doesn't wear thin. My Apple fan friend who took the day off work to line up for an iPad 2 hasn't even bothered to get an iPhone 5 yet. If this represents the future then the ship may have sailed.
It is a measure of how far ahead it is. I would have said ten years but that would have been silly :)
Regardless of the actual time scales involved, IOS has not really moved since it came out (nearly six years ago by the way). On IOS I have eagerly seen the introduction of cut and paste, folders, the notification bar that doesnt really do much, the ability to swap application by double pressing the home button and wading through all the apps that never closed, and tiny little changes that made minor though sometimes pleasing differences to the way it worked. Then Apple invested all their IOS resources into Siri which is almost useless outside the US (unlike both Googles and Samsungs offerings) and, of course, maps (which they already had). Jumping from IOS to Android on the S3 was like going through a hundred of Apples major updates in one go and I still keep finding little touches that surprise me that Apple hadnt thought of them first, let alone at all.
I have lots of Apple products and I like them in the main, I wont upgrade my iPad to IOS 6.0 as it has nothing I want and takes away something I do but I doubt I will ever go back to one of their phones.
By the way, having a low UID on Slashdot is easy. You just have to be a bit of an old twit.
Android has become for mobile devices what Windows is for desktops and laptops.
There is no -1 Disagree mod. Slashdot.org/faq defines mod options. USE IT.
A properly developed application is trivial to deploy for either platform.
Spoken like a true non developer.
Man blir trött av att gå och göra ingenting.
S3 owner here. Pre-ordered mine so I could keep my Verizon unlimited on 4G. No problem with my battery at all.
:(){
The iPhone is nearly six years old which would seem to be a little older than you. Something can feel ten years older than something else even if it was produced at the same time.
Not difficult concepts really as I am sure you will find out one day.
Assuming technology and efficiency in production remains stagnant yes, but technology does improve and efficiency increases. Apples manufacturing and material costs per phone have remained remarkably similar, and ultimately, the minimum ATC of the lowest costing manufacturing plant comes to govern the price.
And if the market price declines below the minimum of a firm's AVC curve, the firm should exit the industry.
poetmatt - price and demand for the iPhone will be fairly inelastic, as the Android phones are not really seen as a substitute.
Walmart profits on necessity spending. How many cell phone apps fall into that category?
I don't know about the apps, but smartphones themselves are increasingly considered a "necessity".
I've known folks who were unemployed and near broke, yet would do whatever it took to keep paying their overpriced $80/month smartphone plan, even if it meant living on junk-food and borrowing money from friends. The only other thing I've seen that makes people behave that way is tobacco.
If the battery is an issue for you, I'm can stretch about 3 days from my Droid Maxx typically. I probably would have gone with an SII or SIII but the company is paying.
Absolutely - if I wanted to spend a ton of money on a phone, I could buy the Tag Heuer Racer Prestige Gold Android phone for 6,500 euros: http://racer.tagheuer.com/reserve/#Prestige_Gold_and_Carbon
And this whole mentality that you pretty much need a computer to own an iPhone has got to go.
iOS 5 did away with that requirement.
Not totally.
Major updates still pretty much require a computer.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
I made the switch and have no regrets.
What really made it all come together though, was an an Android app called Poweramp: http://powerampapp.com/, it does everything I wanted and more -- it still finds album art that iTunes does not.
...what - like the 8GB iPhone 4 that AT&T is selling for less than a dollar? http://www.att.com/shop/wireless/devices/apple/iphone/4-8gb-black.html?WT.srch=1&cagpspn=pla#fbid=Ws5HZMfg-KR
between the iOS ecosystem and device quality and the Android feature set.
In particular, the Galaxy Note series is haunting my dreams. I was a pen user (Newton 2x00, mostly) for many years, but Apple long ago decided that that wasn't the way. In general I've been happy with Apple, but on this they've left me cold.
The Galaxy Note looks great, has the right features, and a reasonable price. But the device quality isn't quite the same and I'm really happy with the iOS ecosystem (and wasn't with Android at least as recently as 2011).
Frustrating. But I could see myself switching at some point if I continue to ogle the Galaxy Note, my big fear being that I'd switch back eventually to have the iOS world of apps back.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
WTF are you talking about, with this "declining societies"? The "middle-class" of Asia is...pathetic. They have no decent infrastructure. Probably, no decent broadband, cable, etc., except for a tiny percentage of their population (and the internet is censored in Corrupt Communist China, for fsck's sake!).
As you say, "the new kids" might use Android. do a little research, you'll probably find out what they really would like to have is the new iPhone! Besides, when you say "no one cares if Apple has great sales in Europe" you come accross as really stupid and clueless because, in your - I am assuming, from your lack of...worldliness - young mind, you demonstrate you haven't a fucking clue about "markets". Please, go see what the Apple stock is worth. Use Google.
In that context, the Android is nothing but a shiny little toy that the typical middle-class teen displays to say his dad's got more money than you. It's pathetic. You gotta see it up close and personal.
It's nothing but a huge marketing clusterfuck, just like Microsoft Windows is a huge marketing clusterfuck/sham.
Main difference between the BSD license and the GPL license: one is from California and the other is from Massachusetts
You Android fanboys have a general lack of big-picture understanding. Let me explain: places like China and India and Latin-America have shitty broadband connection for phones. And, the low-income middle class doesn't really like to pay (in China, in particular).
So, it seems, the real smart strategy for you guys is:
- Write apps in Mandarin
- Write apps in Tamil
- Write apps in Urdu
- Write a new Angry Birds - because that's probably all those customers will be willing to pay.
If you'd only realize the legion of smartphones users who don't even know what "apps" are...
Main difference between the BSD license and the GPL license: one is from California and the other is from Massachusetts
Apple makes the bulk of the cash because it focuses on a small slice of the market, with a highly tuned product (ie, with few options) and in certain markets (such as the US) accounts for 40% or more of the market with that small line.
Dude, really? Could you make that one claim anymore specific or with more variables? Talk about cherry picking statistics to prove a point.
You really think Apples goal is that?
I am the fastest runner ever! Compared to those that have run on Thursday nights naked around my house between the living room and the dining room while Judge Judy is on TV.
Their retained earnings has nearly halved over the last year. They have 100bn in the bank but instead of it growning at 10bn a Q like it used too it struggles to hit the 5 mark.
Where, may I ask?
I wanted an iPhone 5 but no SD card slot is a killer. I'm going to look at the S3 and Nexus and some others.
From what I've seen the S3 is better than the iPhone5 in that it has a SD card slot. Having looked at both, if it weren't for that I'd probably take the iPhone 5. No other android phone I've seen is in this class. Samsung make really nice stuff.
After buying that iPhone and all the associated iGear, there's not much left for anything BUT the bus...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Biggest software ecosystem will win.
I wouldn't be so quick to proclaim that as you are stating Apple wins.
There are more iOS developers, more resources for iOS developers, and much deeper resources for iOS developers than exists for Android.
I would never say any one will "win" however, the eventual end game will be a mixture of devices in healthier proportion than we have seen in the PC market (until recently).
it's awfully tough to compete with "free"
Android is not free, device makers pay Microsoft for the privilege. So for device makers WP8 has the same cost... and now Microsoft leaning heavily.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I owned the S3 from when it came out until last month, and I much prefer a 4S or 5 iPhone to it. Mostly a matter of preferring iOS though. I like having cloud sync for my stuff, Apple TV playing movies and music on my stereo system/TV with the touch of a button, etc. I'm probably just used to iOS, but I keep trying Android and it keeps annoying me and I end up back with iOS.
The S3 hardware is nice, but I don't see how it is six years ahead of an iPhone 5.
It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
Their little cat fight with Samsung put a dent in those margins and the more enemies Apple make the less those margins will be. The figures according to Bloomberg are .... (Apple vs Samsung here).
AAPL
23% Q4 (2011)
28% Q1 (2012)
29% Q2 (2012)
22% Q3 (2012)
005930:KS (Samsung)
7% Q4 (2011)
8% Q1 (2012)
10% Q2 (2012)
12% Q3 (2012)
Now, I was told this could be an annual thing, I.E due to the product launch and margins suffer due to the costs of the launch, though I feel that's not correct because the product's price is always higher during the initial launch and then reduce as product ages in the market.
With some of the productivity issues faced and the margins on components getting slammed (i.e Samsung's recent price hike on apple components) these figures could be a continued trend.
What I like about the trend for Samsung is that it's showing solid steady growth (half of what Apple is doing but it's steady). Apple's just seem overly chaotic which for analysts would worry them a little.
Latest quarter was $8.67 share vs. $7.05 a year ago. This quarter they've been supply constrained on many products. I can see the concern since margins are very high but so far the earnings looks good.
Rather than hurl insults at you, I would merely state that your statements are not original to yourself and that if you disapprove of "copying", you should not copy ill-informed propaganda,
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
Doesn't significant profit indicate that their products are priced correctly?
No. It indicates 2 things - an incredibly gullible market and price gouging
Either iDevices are very over priced or high-end androids are ridiculously cheap. I think both have some truth.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
They sell something better than average at high end prices. Apple does not sell on actual quality, just "Appleness".
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
Switch iOS and Android in your post and you get how I feel. It's mostly a matter of preference.
It all depends on what you mean by popular.
A common way to judge the popularity of a product is by considering the number of people who adopt it. 73% means that almost 3 quarters of people have adopted it. By definition, Apple must be less popular.
Another way of judging popularity is by considering the number of "cool people" who like something. As a /. user, I claim my right to be socially awkward and consider that sort of popularity as totally invalid.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
The fact that you can find NEW phones running Gingerbread or earlier is a complete joke.
Have I missed something? Do those devices not work? Can nobody use them to phone, SMS, email, GPS or take pictures? Are there no cheap/free games to run on these cheap devices?
Of course not. Just as a huge amount of computer users have not got PCs with the latest processors huge amounts of memory and HDD and 28" monitors, a large market sector will quite happily spend less and be happy with "lesser" devices.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
I think I speak for most people when I say that I couldn't give a shit less what you run.
hell, you could run Blackberry as far as I care. Just don't bitch when you can't do something.
-- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
Apple changed the mobile phone market. It took four years for the other phone makers to really catch up with Apple. It is only now that the Android offerings (particularly the Nexus 4 and SIII) have overtaken the iPhone 5, and even this is a cause of much debate and blood feuds. Nokia didn't survive the transition and has one last shot with its Windows Phone 8 stuff.
Apple will be the next Nokia in a few years.
This isn't a fact.
In fact it's a bald faced lie.
This hasn't been true for several years.
From Kogan Australia
Iphone 4S 16 GB = A$599
Iphone 5 16 GB = A$779
Galaxy S 3 16 GB = A$449
From Expansys US.
= US$679
Iphone 5 16GB = US$1039
Galaxy S 3 16GB = US$549
So as you can clearly see, you're talking out of your arse.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Apples to oranges.
We're talking about with one of those cute 2 year contracts, which bring most phones to a tolerable level.
-- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
Not true. Major OS updates can be done without a PC. Indeed, that's exactly how I upgraded.
About a thousand companies wish they had profits as good that that stone.
Fiat Homos et Pereat Theos
Eliminate all Chinese phones: where does Android stand then.
We'd need to eliminate Europe too, because those evil Europeans get everything wrong.
Then we need to cut out parts of US sales.
Finally we have the real statistic, yes the real number that CANNOT be refuted.
100% of Iphone sales are Iphone 0% ARE ANDROID.
MY ARGUMENT IS FLAWLESS, MY NUMBERS ARE INDISPUTABLE. EXTERMINAAAAAAATE.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
China and India don't have that much of an issue with mobile broadband... US on the other hand.
I'm sure most don't know or care what apps are. There are many iPhone users that don;t care for apps as well... But when the legions of Android users start exploring their smartphones they are not going to just switch to iOS...
Except that branded laptops Windows is fully licensed. Sure they reinstall a "better" version of Windows, but it's still a Windows license sold...
Also, it would take a massive effort to create a general purpose smartphone that could get any OS installed on it.
PS: Samsung is the biggest player in Chinese smartphone market. Making iOS portable would change nothing...
I have an iPhone 3GS and I can't use it for a full day either because the battery isn't up to it. The feature phones I had the battery lasted like a week.
That was extremely funny - nice work
If Steve Jobs didn't put it on my phone, I probably didn't need it anyways.
Gingerbread has all of iOS6s "new" features. If it's utter crap, what does that say about iOS6? :-)
Verizon is offering the iPhone 4 free. Make of that what you will.
So do you think Apple's pricing is making them lose market share or not? That is the definition of overpriced even from a business perspective...
None of which can compete with a vertically integrated entity like Samsung.
There are plenty of high end Android devices. The Samsung Galaxy SIII and Galaxy Note II, the Nexus, LG's Optimus G, HTC Droid DNA, Sony XPeria TL, etc.
BTW there is a flash storage solution for iPhone/iPads, it's called an Airstash. My husband has one and uses it constantly to load large media files to and from his iPad.
Sara
Designer, Gamer, Macgrrl in an XP World
"Limited" is like half a dozen top cellphone models or more. Apple has one top cellphone model. Innovation is relative. For people used to a RAZR the iPhone was innovative. For people used to Windows CE devices not really.
Who cares about low latency audio? It isn't an issue for regular users and most of us aren't composers. In contrast all the other options you derided actually have mass market appeal.
1) Your finger is larger than a stylus tip so you lose input precision. 2) The higher end Android phones cost the same or more than an iPhone yet they sell remarkably well. The Samsung Galaxy S III is one example. 3) Apple makes money on the device AND on ads (iAd), selling you content on iTunes, etc. It's like having an Amazon device at many times the price. Have fun getting price gauged.
Not for long. Chrome is probably going to top it soon.
I repair a lot of different phones, but I have to say the 3GS is a nice beast overall - anyhow, the point of this post is, if at some point you get that battery replaced in your 3GS, be aware that you might run in to a few hiccups with it shutting down at 60~30% capacity and then going into an endless reboot. If that happens you can break out of it using instructions at this location - http://ctpc.biz/iphone3gs-battery-fix.html - oh and try get the APN: 616-0435 battery.
"For people used to Windows CE devices not really."
thank you, good to know I'm not the only one who still remembers. wince was not awesome, but it had 3rd party apps and a small but capable community of devs releasing good software, copy/paste, multitasking, a sort of (kinda) usable web browser, a very usable push email client, and a whole host of other things that added up to an.. acceptable compromise I guess is the way to describe it. It worked, it did a lot of stuff that was previously much harder to do mobile, and feature for feature it far outclassed the original iPhone (except the browser). Later generations of the iphone took things farther, but I very clearly remember reading with great interest and then playing with an iphone and deciding "meh, thats neat but my win mobile device is much more useful".
-Lod
And I thought those old Motorola Aura phones were expensive.
I dont have Apple TV but I do have a Max mini as a media center for my TV and Android streams to that no problem with a touch of one button. It helps that my Mac run XMBCI guess. The cloud sync for google is way more extensive than for Apple too actually. I find it a bit too "cloud" based for me and I turned most of it off so I am rather surprised at your experience.
Check out Galaxy Nexus ROM.
Firefox is in the Google Play store. Also, Flash Player (which, in Firefox is disabled with click-to-play by default)
Don't bother looking in the iOS store for anything like that. The third-party browsers for iOS are by-design crippled.
You've got a really broad definition of high end.
different priced devices is also variety of choice .
there's no 100$ iphone so if you need a phone for that price you're not going to get an iphone.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
actually those numbers show a longevity for walmart and a fad like performance for apple. walmarts biz is harder to take away.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Six years? You idiot. In six years EVERY phone will be able to cook your dinner, drive you home, and then kick your ass for the hell of it. Six years ahead... Moron.
Fuck I hope you're not working for a phone company, most of us were waiting for the blowjob app.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
The question is how the monopoly is used. Microsoft's 90% market share was not bad as such, but using it to strongarm other companies out of the market (Stacker? Netscape?) was.
Why? They all are better specced than the iPhone 5. If you can't have those with US local versions get the global version instead. The iPhone is the one which isn't high end enough.
You realise that the chart you linked to *removes the top 5% of sales* (where the majority of the money is) in order to distort the statistics? It's meaningless puffery, and I'm afraid the BB platform has changed far too late to attract any developers.
First, let me say that you react very emotional to something that unimportant than which manufacturer is more important. My point was that limiting the view to the US and maybe other First World region markets to increase the importance of one manufacturer over the other is a flawed approach.
WTF are you talking about, with this "declining societies"? The "middle-class" of Asia is...pathetic. They have no decent infrastructure.
I do not know why you are so fixated on the middle class. Middle class is a declining group in the US and so is is in Europe. Look at the demonstrations in Spain, Portugal and Greece. On the other hand in Asia more and more people are able to buy a smart phone. Yes, they go first with a cheap one. And the numbers of premium phones sold is lower than the number of cheap phones sold (same as in the First World). Furthermore, you are right when you state that the percentage of potential buyers is smaller than in the US or the EU. But the US has 300-350 million inhabitant and the EU has 420 million inhabitants, while China has 1300 million inhabitants and India is of similar size. Therefore, these markets are relevant. Even though China is no democracy and private ownership of homes is not really possible, people invest in personal things, like gadgets.
Probably, no decent broadband, cable, etc., except for a tiny percentage of their population (and the internet is censored in Corrupt Communist China, for fsck's sake!).
Cellphone coverage in the big cities in the east and south are good enough to use a 3G phone there. And the question is not if these things work as comfortable as in the First World, the question is if people are still buying these phones. And they do. As the global market share report shows. Their country has a big corruption problem and yes they are not a democracy, but that had capitalism never stopped to work. BTW China is not a communist country. Their party is just named that way. They have no social security system (even worse than the US) and job guarantee features as Eastern European countries had, before the end of the Cold War.
As you say, "the new kids" might use Android. do a little research, you'll probably find out what they really would like to have is the new iPhone! Besides, when you say "no one cares if Apple has great sales in Europe" you come across as really stupid and clueless because, in your - I am assuming, from your lack of...worldliness - young mind, you demonstrate you haven't a fucking clue about "markets". Please, go see what the Apple stock is worth. Use Google.
Well the market share tells me that they do buy Android phones. And that is what the article and my post was about. The market share indicates what they buy and that are not iPhones. In number of sales the First World is a very limited market. Our population is older and we already have a high market saturation for smart phones. Also we are all going into recession. While those Asian countries only have a reduced growth. As, long as income of the low income groups still rise in those countries, the number of potential first buyers increase which will have a big impact on market shares. While in our Western regions new smart phones replace old ones.
In that context, the Android is nothing but a shiny little toy that the typical middle-class teen displays to say his dad's got more money than you. It's pathetic. You gotta see it up close and personal.
It's nothing but a huge marketing clusterfuck, just like Microsoft Windows is a huge marketing clusterfuck/sham.
If you do not like Android, so be it. I, honestly, do not care less. Especially not in the context of this article. It is about who has a bigger market share and what are the prospects? And they all are in favor of Android. We will see how Windows 8 performs. However, I doubt that it will get that much market share in the next 5 to 1
MS has made embedded XP that run nicely under 256M ram, and 150M disk. An ARM version of this baby would run well on lots of devices. Throw in a directX based GUI Launcher aka Metro and there you have it. WinMobile8.
There is nothing that cant be done in XP, that can in Win8RT .
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Seems like stating the obvious, but i feel this statistic is being misinterpreted...
Hypothetically; you can have a number of people with say... iPhones, who buy a new one on average every 4 years. Then have a same number of people with say... Android phones, who buy a new one on average every year (50/50 users). Now those buying cycles would make Android have a 3/4 (75%) market share in yearly sales, but only a 1/2 the market share of users.
An extreme example perhaps but it illustrates my point, also it loops back into sales because the product that gets bought every 4 years is obviously going to be more expensive, the shortcut for comparison on a yearly basis there would be to look at the gross profit of those devices regardless of units sold. Now if you consider the fact that iPhones have been around quite a bit longer than Android phones, and the recent availability of substantially cheaper Android phones, one could speculate that this is an untapped market, not a market entirely in competition with iPhones. It's difficult to precisely measure the market share of users but given the history of iPhone sales id give a guess that's it's not far of 50/50.
I'm on no ones side here, i just don't like people misinterpreting statistics. Lets keep things real, for the record i have an Android phone... i like both platforms but am not wealthy enough to justify the price of an iPhone for what i use it for.
Android is winning by the same single reson Windows won. Because it's open.
Of course, we have different standards for "open" nowadays. But claiming any other reason is delusional.
Rethinking email
Yeah, it pretty much made everyone mad. I always thought /. should have a troll mod.
How would you know? You're an iOS developer... Amazon's store is crap.
No, I am a mobile developer. I know Java quite well from years of use and COULD develop for Android any time I liked. So I keep a constant eye on the other mobile platforms to see when it might be time to support something else.
As such I also know about sales and currently Amazon is having, by far, the best luck with Android tablet sales. It doesn't matter how crappy the Amazon store might be (and I don't know why you think that) because it's simply the store that most Android tablet owners will see by default.
I work with mobile development shops that develop for all platforms and currently it is MANDATORY to support the Amazon app store for applications.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So do you think Apple's pricing is making them lose market share or not? That is the definition of overpriced even from a business perspective...
That's a very narrow definition, and doesn't take into account a market that is still growing.
Apple has sold more and more iPhones (in terms of units shipped) of each model every time it launches one, yet the percentage of the market that those larger number of units makes up has gone down, thanks to the expansion of the market as a whole (and the success of Android handsets).
Apple is selling them as fast as they can make them - that's the definition of "not overpriced" from a business perspective, regardless of what the marketshare figure is doing due to factors Apple has no control over (namely the increase in the size of the market).
It's not rocket science.
Yes it does. Apple is mobile computing's premium brand. The only questions are the size of the premium segment, and Apple's ability to keep owning it (and challengers' ability to break into it).
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
To me this just smacks of utter stupidity for the Apple leadership. At least they were smart enough to segment their tablet offerings but it is too late. The software and hardware isn't good enough for it to matter.
What on earth are you smoking?
Apple has *never* done business in the way you suggest they should do it (ie, how every other vendor does it) but what hey do works for them.
The "only" have 10% of PC marketshare... but you conveniently leave out that this is 10% coming up from below - ie, they have been growing marketshare year on year in an overall market that is either stagnant or shrinking (one of the very, very few PC vendors to have continuous positive growth). They don't do this by following what everyone else is doing - their market has never been to race to the bottom and compete solely on price.
They follow the same model for smartphones - one flagship, and one or two previous gen phones (currently the 4S and 4). They are selling the 5 as fast as they can make it, so I'm not sure what else you want them to do? Make more of them? They thought of that already. They fundamentally cannot do more than they are right now to grow marketshare in the smartphone market *unless* they start selling cheap low end phones - a market segment that Apple are very happy to leave to low end Android vendors (disclaimer: I am nog calling Android "low end"). They sell three generations of the iPhone and that works for them.
They're not interested in a fight for the bottom of the market. Their history in the PC business shows that (and again, as one of the very few vendors making money and growing marketshare in that space despite their "only" 10% share, it works very well for them).
They never have done it this way? iPod Classic, iPod mini, iPod nano, iPod touch, let me count the ways.
As ever the stats dont tell the full story. This is only 2012 3rdQ sales. It doesn't take into account the number of already installed and working phones. OK