Martin Hill

RIM's Crisis Could Be an Opportunity, Again

RIM investors are right to be worried:
- iPhone sales went from half RIM's sales a quarter ago to almost matching (7.4 million versus 8.3 million) in q3 2009.
- From a platform perspective, Apple has already buried RIM to the tune of approx 11-12 million iPhone OS devices (iPhone & iPod Touch) in q3 2009.
- In two and a bit years the iPhone OS active installed base is already 57 million strong, more than RIM has managed in 10 years.
- RIM’s profit share of the total cellphone market of 15% sounds fantastic until you realise that Apple’s share (not counting the iPod Touch) is 20% - of the whole flippn’ cellphone market! (not just smartphones)
- 100,000 iPhone apps vs 2,000 Blackberry apps (and no, they are definitely not all fart apps)
- 100 million iTunes credit card accounts vs 32 million Blackberry subscribers (not a direct comparison but useful nonetheless)

All this and Apple isn't even yet on half the carriers that RIM supplies.

-Mart

Why Amazon Isn't Worried About iPhone's Kindle

The number of people content to purchase a large boxy single-purpose plasticky reading device which can't be read in low light or dark conditions, which can't display colour photos, illustrations, animations or video clips is a pretty limited market.

This makes having a Kindle app available for the over 50 million iPhones and iPod Touches that have been sold (not 10-15 million as the article states) is essential to the success of the Kindle ebook sales platform.

-Mart

Looks Like We're Still a BlackBerry Nation

Joel,
As I posted on Naveen's blog yesterday, if you consider Apple vs RIM from a platform perspective, you need to count the iPod Touch in with the iPhone as both run the iPhone OS and both run Apps.

From that perspective Apple has been beating RIM for the previous 2 quarters and is neck and neck this last quarter. It's not all about phones anymore but mobile OS platform.

-Mart

Apple: Three Battles Won, Nicely Positioned for the Fourth

Moon,
Apple has not been sacking anyone en masse. Those 15,600 positions are FTE (full-time-equivalent) positions. Apple just sensibly trimmed the hours of some of their retail staff during this economic downturn. Enough with the Chicken Little "sky is falling" nonsense.

mediamemo.allthingsd.c...

Also, Naveen, if you consider Apple vs RIM from a platform perspective, you need to count the iPod Touch in with the iPhone as both run the iPhone OS and both run Apps. From that perspective Apple has been beating RIM for the previous 2 quarters and is neck and neck this last quarter. It's not all about phones anymore but mobile OS platform.

-Mart

The Ongoing Smartphone Revolution

This couple of sentences in particular raises plenty of eyebrows:

"If I were in the market right now, I would want a Google Android device. The combination of features and benefits puts it at the top of the heap. Unfortunately Google, for all their technical brilliance, are very bad at marketing. So Apple, who are absolutely brilliant at marketing, continue to outperform with their inferior iPhone."

The HTC G1, the first and so far only Android phone has been widely panned as buggy, clunky, fat, lacking the ability to synch with Exchange, with inconsistent interfaces in each of the bundled apps, no integrated Music store, movie store, TV shows, podcasts, few apps available from the Android Market, no peripheral ecosystem like the 3,000+ peripherals available for the iPhone/iPod etc.

How this translates into putting Android at the top of the heap at this point in time boggles the mind.

Perish the thought that the iPhone might have a feature or two that justifies the hype around it.

-Mart

The Ongoing Smartphone Revolution

Great analysis from those above commenting on what is a very poorly written article by Bruce Everiss.

Bruce, you really need to learn how to ground your arguments with examples and reasons for anyone to take you seriously.

And please Apple haters like crazylegs, could you give some justification to your own arguments rather than launching a "fanboi" attack? It would be much more constructive and might even get you some respect rather than a collective rolling of the eyes.

thankee.

-Mart

Apple and Amazon's Open Embrace

One small correction - Apple did not introduce DRM-free music in response to Amazon. Apple had introduced the iTunes Plus DRM-free format for all their EMI content well before Amazon launched.

The delay in the rest of the iTunes music library going DRM-free was due to Universal, Sony and Warner trying to slow the iTunes juggernaut and give challengers like Amazon a leg up.

Needless to say, they failed and in the end only reinforced Apple's grip on the digital music and MP3-player markets.

As far as DRM-free eBooks are concerned, I have been a very happy customer of Baen's DRM-free library of SciFi and Fantasy books for quite a number of years. It is a shame they are in the minority amongst eBook publishers in this area.

-Mart

The Downside to iPhone Success

Damn, not sure why I got the duplicate posts above.

As far as your second response is concerned:

“Well, for my idea to be impossible, it seems at least one of the following have to be true:
1. Apple is perfect and never allows anything *that could be susceptible to* a virus get through its store.”

Scott, even if a malware author registered all their vital details with Apple (including financial information), paid their $99 entry fee, was approved by Apple into the iPhone developer program and then managed to get an app approved into the App Store that had undetectable malware hidden inside - as soon as it was discovered, Apple would flick the Kill Switch and bam, the app would be neutralised on every iPhone in the world.

“2. No iPhone ever accesses any content from any other iPhone or the Internet that might be used to infect a susceptible app or phone.”

Ah, but the sandboxed security model of the iPhone means no apps can be downloaded to the iPhone from the web or another iPhone and run without being securely signed by Apple through the App Store. Even social engineering won’t allow users to download any old app from the internet or another iPhone and run it - unlike a PC or Mac, or a Windows Mobile, Palm, Nokia or Android phone. (jailbroken iPhones are such a small percentage of the total that they do not count)

The easy infection vectors are just not available on the iPhone unlike virtually every other platform making it far more difficult for malware to survive let alone flourish.

-Mart

The Downside to iPhone Success

Scott, no need to jump to the "attack of the fanboys" defense.

Your argument that "the most widespread iPhone application in 2009 will be a virus" is so patently impossible it does not take a fanboy to realise this.

Apple's central global remote "kill switch" capability combined with tight control over what programs are approved in the App Store as well as mandatory secure app certificate-signing and the iPhone's automatic app update notification mechanism makes it virtually impossible for a virus to even get out of the starting gate let alone replicate amongst a helpless public.

www.ipodobserver.com/s...

www.appleinsider.com/a...

In contrast Windows Mobile which lacks all of these security mechanisms already suffers from quite a number of viruses and trojans as does Symbian and Palm and it looks like Google's Android will suffer the same fate. With a wide-open distribution model without any editorial control and with the ability for users to easily get apps from sources other than Google's marketplace it looks like it will be Android following in Windows virus-ridden footsteps (160,000 viruses and counting) not the iPhone.

In the interests of responsible journalism, would you please post a retraction of this inaccurate article? Thanks!

-Mart

The Downside to iPhone Success

Scott, no need to jump to the "attack of the fanboys" defense.

Your argument that "the most widespread iPhone application in 2009 will be a virus" is so patently impossible it does not take a fanboy to realise this.

Apple's central global remote "kill switch" capability combined with tight control over what programs are approved in the App Store as well as mandatory secure app certificate-signing and the iPhone's automatic app update notification mechanism makes it virtually impossible for a virus to even get out of the starting gate let alone replicate amongst a helpless public.

www.ipodobserver.com/s...

www.appleinsider.com/a...

In contrast Windows Mobile which lacks all of these security mechanisms already suffers from quite a number of viruses and trojans as does Symbian and Palm and it looks like Google's Android will suffer the same fate. With a wide-open distribution model without any editorial control and with the ability for users to easily get apps from sources other than Google's marketplace it looks like it will be Android following in Windows virus-ridden footsteps (160,000 viruses and counting) not the iPhone.

In the interests of responsible journalism, would you please post a retraction of this inaccurate article? Thanks!

-Mart

Revisiting the iPhone’s Browsing Market Share (Part II)

Ai yi yi yi, not sure how I managed to post three copies of my comment. Apologies all. :-(

-Mart

Revisiting the iPhone’s Browsing Market Share (Part II)

Well, according to Net Applications (which isn’t restricted to tracking only a limited number of cut-down mobile-web only sites) in September 2008, compared to all other mobile platforms, the iPhone/iPod Touch together now has a web browser marketshare of about 70% or
- 6 times greater than Windows Mobile/WinCE,
- 12 times greater than Nokia’s Symbian and
- 36 times greater than the PlayStation Portable.
- Blackberry and Palm don't even get on the graph and no other mobile platform comes close.
- The iPhone is even thrashing non-mobile platforms such as the Nintendo Wii (36x smaller), PS3 (16x smaller) etc.

marketshare.hitslink.c...

Then there is Google’s discovery a little while back that 50 times more searches occur from Apple‘s iPhone than any other mobile handset. Google “thought it was a mistake and made their engineers check the logs again,” said Vic Gundotra, head of Google’s mobile operations:

www.ft.com/cms/s/667f1...

Of course, Google plays on a far larger stage and is definitely not limited to mobile-only websites unlike AdMob.

blogs.computerworld.co...

As you say, the reason Admob is recording a much lower percentage of iPhones using mobile sites is of course because the vast majority of iPhone users browse the real web, not neutered mobile-only sites which most other phone users are restricted to.

-Mart

Revisiting the iPhone’s Browsing Market Share (Part II)

Well, according to Net Applications (which isn’t restricted to tracking only a limited number of cut-down mobile-web only sites) in September 2008, compared to all other mobile platforms, the iPhone/iPod Touch together now has a web browser marketshare of about 70% or
- 6 times greater than Windows Mobile/WinCE,
- 12 times greater than Nokia’s Symbian and
- 36 times greater than the PlayStation Portable.
- Blackberry and Palm don't even get on the graph and no other mobile platform comes close.
- The iPhone is even thrashing non-mobile platforms such as the Nintendo Wii (36x smaller), PS3 (16x smaller) etc.

marketshare.hitslink.c...

Then there is Google’s discovery a little while back that 50 times more searches occur from Apple‘s iPhone than any other mobile handset. Google “thought it was a mistake and made their engineers check the logs again,” said Vic Gundotra, head of Google’s mobile operations:

www.ft.com/cms/s/667f1...

Of course, Google plays on a far larger stage and is definitely not limited to mobile-only websites unlike AdMob.

blogs.computerworld.co...

As you say, the reason Admob is recording a much lower percentage of iPhones using mobile sites is of course because the vast majority of iPhone users browse the real web, not neutered mobile-only sites which most other phone users are restricted to.

-Mart

Can Apple's Resistance to Flash Content Last?

Dana, the crucial point you seem to be missing is that all those "half billion" phones are not running Flash. They are running Flash Lite 3.0 (or older) which does not work with the vast majority of Flash sites out on the web. The full Flash version is at v.9.0 now.

Flash Lite is instead used mostly to create the user-interface and portals on phones particularly in Japan etc.

The world is moving towards the open Web 2.0 standards of Ajax and Javascript that the iPhone fully supports. This is the direction Apple is headed - not pushing for the proprietary, expensive, processor-hogging, battery-draining Flash or the limited, cut-down Flash Lite.

-Mart

The iPhone: Apple's First Flop

Todd, I like many others am shaking my head at the holes in your arguments. I’ll restrict myself to your “More isn’t always better” argument for now though as others have eloquently addressed most of the other issues.

You are correct that “featuritis” and “all-in-ones” are often jacks of all trades but masters of none. My wife and I both have Windows mobile-powered HTC-designed PDA-smartphones (O2 Mini and O2 XDA IIs) which suffer from exactly this ailment. They’ll do just about anything and run almost any software but I am getting to the stage of loathing mine as it is the worst phone/PDA I have ever used. The OS crashes and freezes daily, texting, the address book, connecting to wifi, launching apps, the blasted start menu etc are all some of the worst-designed pieces of software I’ve ever seen. Physically my XDA IIs has so many plastic buttons and a slide-out keyboard half of which don’t work anymore that I am about to go back to using my old Sony Ericsson P900 PDA phone which despite it’s own problems is so much better as a phone and PDA it’s like night and day.

However, you don’t seem to be aware that simplicity and elegant integration is Apple’s mantra meaning that this issue will be at the forefront of all of the design considerations with the iPhone. Haven’t you noticed that despite the elegance and ease of use of the iPod, it actually does have a huge number of extra features including video playback, games, calendar, address book (all synchronised with your master computer), alarm clock, stopwatch, world clocks, equalizer, password-protected volume limiter, etc etc. The difference is in the design and details. For example, Apple has elegantly made sure the FM radio controls only appear when you plug in the optional FM radio remote control, the audio recording menu only appears when you plug in a Belkin or MicroMemo microphone adapter, etc so they don’t clutter up the interface when not in use. Apple takes the time to make all of the elements masters of the trade – not chucked in bloat like most Microsoft designs.

As far as people not wanting a device that does everything – you couldn’t be more wrong. I have a 60GB video iPod that I just don’t use anymore because I got fed up carrying it and my cell phone with me all the time. People do want to carry around a device that does all the tasks you might want to do when mobile as long as all the functions work well individually and together. Not hacked-together with an awful mess of an interface like Windows Mobile and to a lesser degree Symbian or Palm.

As far as your comment that Apple should sell the iPhone with only 2GB of storage – are you crazy? About the only reason I may not get the initial version of the iPhone is because it doesn’t have <b>enough</b&... storage to store all my music photos and video. Haven’t you seen the recent ChangeWave survey that indicated the main reason people wanted an iPhone was because it had so much storage capacity! The number one reason for wanting the iPhone is storage for crying out loud!

Sheesh.

-Mart