Apple Floundering?

There was a mixed reaction yesterday at Apple's media day to the announcement of iPhone 4S. Every was expecting the iPhone 5, but it didn't happen. My initial thoughts were that Apple was forced to show something. Yes, there were some software improvements and Siri is cool, but was it really worth the effort of the PR push? I believe some analysts who wrote about production delays on the iPhone 5 called it correctly. There was no way they could launch the iPhone 5 in October or even November, but with the Kindle Fire announcement and the upcoming launch of Samsung's Nexus Prime and Android's Ice Cream Sandwich operating system Apple felt the pressure.

Android is still experiencing leaps in growth while Apple's market share of the mobile OS pie is stagnant. Bill Gurley called it correctly months ago that Android is an unstoppable freight train, and Apple feels it coming. Samsung alone approaches iPhone's sales numbers and I stated for a while now that by 2013 Android will takeover the seemingly unstoppable iPad in the tablet market. And this is not Tim Cook's fault. Whether it was Cook or Jobs, this was and is inevitable, which is why Apple had to start a patent battle that many consider dirty or counter to all that Silicon Valley stands for.

Mobile TV in Korea on Galaxy S, FaceTime is Behind in Korea

Just a video shot (from my Samsung Galaxy S) of a Galaxy S in South Korea. My friend, Eugene, was just showing me the mobile TV (terrestrial DMB) service which comes standard on many phones in Korea. Korea was the first to launch mobile TV in the world with initially satellite DMB/TV and then regular terrestrial DMB/TV became available several months later. One source states that this was launched in 2005, but I remember some of my friends getting early access to mobile TV in Korea during 2004. Maybe my memory is fading as I hit forty.



Also since mobile video conferencing has been in Korea for several years (Apple calls this "FaceTime" like it was something they invented), Eugene talked about how it was lame on the iPhone 4 since it's limited to other iPhone 4s while in Korea other mobile phones allow video conferencing across all phone models and wireless networks.

Samsung Instinct Breaks Best Buy Sales Record

Over at IntoMobile, they are reporting that "Sprint's Instinct is now the best-selling handset to have graced Best Buy's inventory in the past two years."

I wonder how many Instincts have been sold over this period? Doing a quick search didn't bring up anything. Q1 of this year there were nearly 31 million handsets sold in the U.S. and Samsung was number two after Motorola.

Putting Apple's iPhone in perspective, I believe they have sold 4 million so far, which is about what Nokia sells in a week globally.