Analysis
Latest
Here's what we know about the Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes trailer
The complexity and depth of Metal Gear's fictional history and lore rivals that of any RPG worth its salt, and as a result many of you may have had no idea what happened in the Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes trailer that dropped a few hours ago, especially if your history with Metal Gear never extended to the PSP.Luckily for you, the Joystiq Qrew has spent over four hundred trillion collective hours immersed in the murky waters of Metal Gear, so we're going to lay down what the eff just happened as best we can. Needless to say, things could get a bit spoilersy, so all the goodies have been tucked away after the break.
Gartner: worldwide mobile phone sales dipped 2.3 percent while users wait for next iPhone
Gartner is reporting that worldwide mobile phone sales this quarter dropped 2.3 percent as buyers postponed upgrades and held out for the next big thing. Of the 419 million units sold in the last three months, Samsung, Nokia and Apple unsurprisingly took the lion's share of the sales, while ZTE and LG rounded out the top five. Overall, Android's the most popular phone operating system, running 64.1 percent of all new handsets, while iOS phones came in second with 18.8 percent. If you feel like you need some more spreadsheets in your life, then read on for the full breakdown.
Investment group predicts positive returns for Star Wars: The Old Republic following free-to-play announcement
Yesterday's bombshell from Star Wars: The Old Republic has prompted the usual spirited debate among fans over the game: Is this a last gasp before it dies or a smart move in the current MMO marketplace? Wedbush Securities believes it's the latter, with analyst Michael Pachter stating that the news from Electronic Arts is positive and that the change in business models should result in a significant profit for the game. Pachter described Wedbush's reaction as "incorrigibly positive," with specific emphasis on EA's digital catalogue and the free-to-play shift for Star Wars: The Old Republic. According to his analysis, the change in business models will remove the most significant hurdles from potential players, leading to a net increase in revenue from the game. The market as a whole responded positively to the financial news, with EA's stock rising six percent as a result of the call. Pachter has previously been critical of the MMO market, having claimed in early July that subscriber numbers have peaked for the industry as a whole.
Canalys: PC and tablet shipments hit new high in Q2 with Apple in the lead, HP next in line
Wondering how the industry fared in the second quarter of 2012? Shipments in the PC sector, which in Canalys' book includes tablets, were higher than ever, totaling 108,708,780 units globally. iPad sales put Apple in the lead, with more than 21 million devices shipped (this figure also includes desktops and notebooks) in Q2, compared to just over 13 million during the year-ago quarter, representing a massive 59.6-percent year-over-year growth. HP, which led the way in Q1, has fallen to the second-place spot, with nearly 13.6 million shipments during the quarter ending yesterday, followed by Lenovo with about 13.2 million, Acer with nearly 10.7 million and Dell with roughly 9.7 computers sold. Manufacturers like ASUS and Samsung are represented in the substantial "others" category, which totals about 40.6 million devices. There's no question that the iPad is behind Apple earning the number-1 slot, and with the upcoming Windows 8 launch, those figures could shift drastically the next time around. Click on through to the source link below for the full Canalys breakdown.
Report: Global MMO spending to top $12 billion in 2012
Number-crunching services SuperData Research and Newzoo released reports today forecasting strong growth in the MMO industry. According to the analysts, worldwide spending on MMOs will top $12 billion this year, and that's not all: The companies also predict that this number will increase to a whopping $17.5 billion in 2015. Other facts released in the reports: Yearly MMO market growth increased by 14% in the U.S. and 24% in Germany. The number of MMOs in the field has doubled since the start of 2011. Twenty-three of the 50 million U.S. MMO gamers spend money on subscriptions or microtransactions, a 3% increase from 2011. The yearly average amount spent is $127. More German players spend money on MMOs than in the U.S. -- 13% more, to be exact. Free-to-play revenues in the U.S. now account for 50% of the market, up from 39% in 2010. Science-fiction MMOs make up to three times as much money as their fantasy counterparts. SuperData CEO Joost van Dreunen says that the race for gamers' wallets is only getting started: "The current market saturation forces MMO publishers to compete over a finite gamer population." [Source: SuperData Research/Newzoo press release]
One-bit Internet: The iPad is/isn't a content creation device
In the conclusion to my Retina MacBook repairability post, I wrote: "on the Internet, it often seems that everything must be compressed to a one-bit image: black or white, triumph or catastrophe, the very best or the absolute worst." So it goes for the eternal debate over whether the iPad is a "content consumption" or "content creation" device -- a debate given fresh impetus by the new round of starting to sound a bit credible rumors of a 7.85" iPad. The theory goes is that the 10" iPad will be for content creation and the 7.85" one for content consumption, like there's some sort of absolute line in the sand you cross at 9" screen size. This is, as I am sure you are aware, a debate as old as the iPad itself. "A computer without a mouse or keyboard," went the argument when the iPad was announced, "is no kind of computer at all." Then people started using iPads to write books, paint pictures, make music, and much, much more. Harry Marks recently summarised the position of most of the Apple blogosphere when he dismissed the "iPad is made for consumption" idea as "thoroughly-debunked". Is Harry right? Frankly, I don't think it's that simple. I think this is another instance of the Internet compressing a nuanced issue down into an ill-fitting soundbite, and I'm hoping to convince you of the same. Drawing up battlelines First, we need to define exactly what we might do with an iPad. The "consumption" part is pretty easy to define -- reading books, browsing websites, watching Netflix, and so forth. Anything with minimal interactivity. I think most people will agree the iPad is fine for these tasks -- you might say the screen could be a bigger for video, the speaker certainly isn't fantastic for music, and you may prefer an e-ink screen for novels. By and large, thought, the iPad is a good choice. Other apps have a lot of interactivity (so aren't passive, like consumption) but where you aren't making anything new either (so unlike creation). Games are the most obvious example of this, and again, games are enormously popular. "Creation" is trickier to nail down. We can all agree that writing a novel in Pages or sketching a design in Paper counts. Call that "macrocreation". But what about writing a Facebook status update, or adding an item to a to-do list, or sharing a quick snap on Instagram? Clearly, some content has been created, but these "microcreation" tasks take far less time and effort. Some apps, like Mail, can be used for consumption, microcreation, or macrocreation as the situation demands. This differentiation is important because any inadequacies of the iPad's input devices will be far less annoying when doing microcreation, so those types of creation aren't less interesting for us to consider. Even if you despise touchscreen keyboards with the nuclear fuelled heat of a thousand suns, you can probably manage to peck out a tweet without killing anyone. As such, I'll be focussing on macrocreation tasks in the rest of this post, as that's where the rubber really meets the road. Before we dive in, though, a brief survey of the App Store might be illuminating. In the UK's top 50 iPad apps, I counted 41 games, five content creation apps (iPhoto, GarageBand, Pages, iMovie, and Numbers), and four miscellaneous apps. Thinking that content creation apps might be more expensive, and hence skew towards lower sales, I then checked through the first 100 entries on the Highest Grossing Apps list instead, which included the following content creation apps: 5th place -- Pages 21st place -- QuickOffice 24th place -- Numbers 37th place -- GarageBand 40th place -- iPhoto 41st place -- Keynote 58th place -- iMovie So, depending on how you measure, 7-10% of the iPad's top apps are for content creation. I don't think that's a lot, and futhermore, I contend this is representative of people's interests when they buy an iPad -- heavily skewed towards, but not entirely about, consumption. Why might that be the case? The iPad's shortcomings as a content creation device The iPad has one primary input mechanism: a capacitative touchscreen. This compares to traditional computer's two mechanisms: a keyboard plus a mouse (or trackpad or similar pointing device.) As such, the iPad has definite downsides: When you're typing, you're hammering your fingers against an unyielding and undifferentiated sheet of glass; this is objectively less comfortable than a mechanical keyboard. The keyboard hides number keys and uncommon punctuation on a second screen, making numeric data entry or programming tedious. The keyboard takes up more than half of the screen, leaving you squinting at your content through a truncated letterbox. When tapping, you're using a squishy and imprecise fingertip rather than a pixel-perfect pointer. Finally, the iPad's relatively small 9.7" screen can be a limitation for some tasks. That's not to say that people haven't successfully written novels on an iPad, or made artwork with it. People have also made sculptures from scrap iron, cityscapes from toothpicks and written novels by blinking their eye. Great content can be produced with even the most awkward of tools, but it's clearly silly to suggest this intrinsically means that all interfaces are equal. Other creation tasks are less impeded by the iPad. If the primary interaction is with a custom UI made up of buttons -- such as GarageBand or iPhoto -- then the iPad doesn't have many downsides. The screen's a bit small, which can be a pain; I love to see as much as possible when I'm working, which is why I bought a 27" iMac. Still, though, that's usually a minor point. There's an upside, too: interacting with an app by tapping on-screen buttons feels viscerally satisfying in a way that indirect clicking with a mouse pointer can't quite match. I'm very fond of mind-mapping software iThoughtsHD for this reason; most of my longer TUAW posts start life with me sprawled in a comfortable chair, iPad in hand, noodling away creating a detailed outline., intuitively dragging boxes around to re-order content. My MacBook simply can't bring that sort of ease to that sort of use case. However, it's worth noting that these kinds of tasks are rather less common that typing and tapping on things. In particular, I don't think it's a particularly strong argument to use GarageBand as some kind of absolute proof that the iPad is capable of Serious Business. I think that for the vast majority of iPad users, GarageBand is a no more than a toy -- not because it isn't powerful, but because what it does is of limited interest for serious creation unless you are blessed with musical abilities. I own GarageBand, like a lot of people; I played with it for a few hours before growing bored and moving on, and I suspect that's like a lot of other people too. It's also worth noting that some tasks can squeeze without serious compromise into the iPhone's 3.5" screen, let alone the iPad. The popularity of photo editing apps clearly demonstrates this principle. Even the iPhone can be effectively used for content creation, within its own constraints. The Bluetooth factor "Ah," you may have thought when you read the last section, "but what about Bluetooth keyboards? Doesn't that solve the typing problem? Lots of bloggers are forever writing about how an iPad and a keyboard is their perfect mobile setup." It's certainly true that a Bluetooth keyboard helps. For example, I've written chunks of this very post on my iPad, coupled with the Logitech Ultrathin Keyboard Cover which I bought after Steve's positive review. I like it a lot. But it's not without its own downsides; in my own review, I noted that the keys are rather small (my typing accuracy is noticeably lower when I'm using it) and when it's attached to my iPad you end up with a composite device that's barely thinner or lighter than the 11.6" MacBook Air that I would better off using. This is even more of an issue for accessories like the Incase Origami Workstation, which combine an iPad with a full-size Apple Bluetooth keyboard. There's also difficulties with text selection, cursor movement, and operations like formatting text via button bars. The usual keyboard functions work for jumping around, but when you want to precisely select or move through large blocks of text there's no substitute for a mouse or trackpad. Tapping on the screen, by comparison, feels clumsy and slow (I find the little pause before the cut/copy/paste menu appears particularly maddening when I'm trying to work quickly). It's also tough on the arms to keep reaching up to the screen. "Touch surfaces don't want to be vertical... it's ergonomically terrible," said Steve Jobs in 2010, when explaining why Apple wouldn't launch a touch-enabled MacBook or iMac. Of filesystems and multitasking Writers are also peculiar in the demands they place on a device in terms of storage of work: we mostly just need to keep a handful of text files around, one per project we are working on, perhaps some fragmentary notes. There are some huge number of Dropbox powered text editors that are really good at this, which has led some bloggers to declare the premature demise of the user-visible file system. However, other people have other demands. Some people need to keep tens of thousands of files in a structured archive. An accounts team might store invoices (in a wordprocessor format) with related to calculation records (in a spreadsheet). Pretty much everyone benefits from being able to search all of their files for a given word or phrase, but iOS's Spotlight is closed to third-party apps so it can't see most of your data. Most people need to print stuff from time to time. iOS is beyond awful at all of these things. Files are locked inside an app; users cannot slice across apps to show, say, all the files related to a specific project, or all the files from May 2010. If you start running low on disk space and want to make room, you need to delete files -- most apps don't support any sort of off-device storage. Someone who used an iPad as their only computer for processing photographs would appear to be completely out of luck once the iPad is full, as the Photos app offers no facilities to help. Printing is fiddly; AirPrint support is confined to a handful of models and other solutions involve having a PC or Mac around to act as an intermediary. A solution to these problems could take the form of a Files.app for iOS, as Rene Ritchie suggests. Or perhaps Apple has something else in mind altogether -- something involving tagging files and powerful searching functions, say, as proposed in numerous research projects over the years. Nevertheless, it is my belief that until something changes there are significant content creation tasks that the iPad will remain woefully clumsy at. Battery life Harry McCracken, who wrote one of the canonical "my iPad is my primary computer" posts, said: And it was one specific thing about the iPad that made it so useful on the trip: I could use it for ten hours at a pop without worrying about plugging it in. ... I can't overemphasize how important this is to my particular workdays. Even when I'm not traveling, I spend a lot of time bopping around San Francisco and the Bay Area, attending conferences, visiting tech companies, working out of hotel lobbies, and generally having spotty access to power outlets. So, hands up: who here spends their working life, or their personal life for that matter, "bopping around San Francisco", jumping from conference to tech company to hotel? There's a quorum of superstar bloggers and CEOs who will tell you the iPad is perfect because it perfectly suits what they do -- they prize portability, battery life, and ubiquitous cellular Internet over all other concerns. These people are not normal, and no matter how big a pulpit they preach from -- no matter how amplified their voice is in the debate -- their argument doesn't extend to most people. Sure, more battery life is always welcome; but for most people it's just one factor amongst many, not the overriding concern. And who knows, maybe one day Apple will finally give us a MacBook with 4G networking. Multitasking and distraction Many, many pixels have been expended praising iOS for being a "distraction free" writing environment. It's great, people say, because it's "focused" and has nothing "competing for [your] attention". I can only assume these people are using some strange version of OS X where the Twitter and email clients don't have quit buttons. On my Mac, I can close all the apps I don't want to see and remove distractions without doing anything as drastic as changing OS. Lion even has a button that can make most apps take up the entire screen, in case one's ADD becomes so bad that one cannot risk glancing at even one small corner of a Finder window. Meanwhile, like many of the people who use computers, a lot of what I do cannot be served by a single app, which means iOS's weak multitasking becomes an issue. Blogging is fine -- Writing Kit integrates a text editor with a browser, so I can quickly do fact checking or find source links as I write without having to hop out of my app. I presume that's why you don't hear many bloggers complaining about this. Other tasks are complicated by the way you can only see one app at once and because switching back and forth is relatively slow and relatively laborious (which is why many bloggers have asked for cmd-tab support on iOS.) Try making a calendar entry from details sent in an email, for example -- if the automatic tap-to-make-entry fails you, lots of tedious back-and-forthing between two apps becomes necessary. Try collating data from a dozen disconnected cells in a spreadsheet into a wordprocessor document. Try cross-checking two spreadsheets against each other. Try following a tutorial in a web page about how to carry out a task in your presentation software. Try plagiarising a Wikipedia page by subtly rewording it into a high school paper. And so on, and so forth. These are all mundane content creation tasks that are much harder on an iPad than on a traditional computer, by virtue of iOS's sandboxed, one-app-at-once nature. To add insult to injury, not all apps perfectly maintain state when you switch away from them and then back. Even Apple is guilty of this -- if you pull up the "tweet this" dialog in iOS 5, then switch over to Safari to check something in your half-written tweet, when you switch back the tweet draft vanishes. This has enraged me on several occasions. Content creation is a niche I cannot prove this, but I suspect for some of the more dedicated Apple pundits the debate about whether the iPad is a content creation device or not has bigger implications. Steve Jobs famously declared that the iPad was the future of computing, that traditional computers would become "trucks" and gradually fade away, left only to specialists. If the iPad is just a "toy", of course, then Jobs would be wrong; and I think some people are, for whatever reason, emotionally invested in Jobs being right. This is why this argument won't die. Any suggestion that the iPad isn't a content creation device is perceived a challenge to the glorious "post-PC future". However, there's an aspect to this debate which is rarely touched on, but was brought up by Jared Earle on Twitter recently: some large proportion of traditional computers are also content consumption devices. How many laptops spend their lives on a living room coffee table, used to browse Facebook and Amazon? Of the millions of laptops sold each year, how many are used primarily for the sort of tasks the iPad isn't great at? Surely not that many. So it's my opinion that we can disconnect these two arguments. Suggesting that the iPad has its shortcomings as a content creation device doesn't imply that it won't be the future of computing, because I think the appetite that most people have for content creation on home computers has been somewhat overstated by people eager to portray the iPad as an underpowered novelty. Work computers are different, however (and of course make up a lot of sales volume.) I think the iPad has a long way to go before it can supplant the workhorse office PC, but that's a debate for another day. A choice, with side of compromise It is my contention that the conclusion to the above analysis must be that the iPad is, at best, a compromised device for content creation tasks. Typing is inherently awkward and pointing is inherently imprecise, and most content creation involves quite a bit of those two things. Adding a keyboard can partly address the typing issue, but you end up with a device that's only minimally more portable than an 11.6" MacBook Air. Compromises. If you can't afford to buy everything (who can?) and you spend more time reading than writing (most do), an iPad might serve you better than a MacBook. If you're (say) liveblogging an Apple keynote, where typing speed is absolutely paramount, you'll be wanting a physical keyboard, as Mat Honan says. If you're processing lots of photos and video, you'll probably want the CPU grunt of an iMac if mobility doesn't matter or a high-end MacBook Pro if it does. Again, compromises, everywhere you turn. No device is one-size-fits-all, including the iPad. It's fine to acknowledge the shortcomings of an iPad for content creation, whilst keeping in mind that these are only shortcomings -- not hard limits. What's important is understanding your needs and the ways different devices can fulfil or frustrate them. What's important is the nuance; the shades of grey between the "the iPad is a toy" and "the iPad is the future of computing" extremes.
EVE Online posts financial data for the past several months
When you think about the economy, is your primary concern whether or not the latest updates to combat have impacted mining operations and mineral prices? If so, you're probably an EVE Online player, and you'll be happy to know that CCP Games has released a full blog post detailing the economic trends for the game over the past several months. The good news is that the heavy inflation that's been at work for several months is starting to subside; the bad news is that the market is having issues with mineral prices. In short, following the announcement of loot drop changes, several players stockpiled minerals for resale after the change. This wound up dovetailing with the player-run Hulkageddon event, which resulted in several mineral stockpiles and a dearth of ongoing mining operations. The overall outlook is still positive, but mining operations are still recovering from these effects, meaning that movement will likely be tepid for a while.
Visualized: ThreadWatch tracks daily workflow on a Mac, turns the data into eye candy
Sure, time tracking comes in handy when trying to make your workflow as efficient as possible. Perhaps you're looking for a more visual indication of how your time is spent on that MacBook Pro. That's where ThreadWatch comes in handy. Thanks to developer Alex Milde, you can visually analyze your daily task habits on a Mac. After a rather quick and painless app download, the tech monitors software being used on the desktop, taking notes on their individual memory and CPU consumption. The collected info is placed in a text file that you'll then upload to ThreadWatch to create the graphical splendor you see above. Each color indicates a different application and you won't have to worry about having your tracked data catalogued. To take the kit for a spin, hit the source link below to start monitoring your procrastination... er, work sessions.
IDC: Android has a heady 59 percent of world smartphone share, iPhone still on the way up
We've been jonesing for a more international look at smartphone market share for the start of 2012, and IDC is now more than willing to oblige. In case you'd thought Android's relentless march upwards was just an American fling, Google's OS has jumped from 36.1 percent of the world's share a year ago to exactly 59 percent in the first quarter of this year. That's nearly two thirds of all smartphones, folks. As we've seen in the past, Android is siphoning off legacy users looking for something fresher: Symbian and the BlackBerry have both lost more than half of their share in one year's time, while Linux (led mostly by Bada) and Windows Mobile / Phone together lost small pieces of the pie despite raw shipment numbers going up. As for Apple? Even with all the heat in the kitchen, the iPhone's share grew to 23 percent, leading to a staggering 82 percent of smartphone buyers siding with either the Cupertino or Mountain View camps.
More than 70 percent of mobile users pay little for apps, big spenders make up for us cheapskates
We know smartphone and tablet owners like to buy games. But if you go by a new ABI exploration of user habits, most of us aren't buying much of anything. More than 70 percent of the crowd spends little to nothing on mobile apps, dragging down the average of $14 spent per month among paying customers to a median of $7.50 when you include the skinflints. As you might imagine, that leaves the remaining 30 percent making up for a lot of slack: three percent of downloaders represent a fifth of all the spending in the mobile app world. Researchers suggest that developers focus on a long-term strategy of freemium pricing or utility apps to get more customers buying, but we imagine that writing more games about catapulting frustrated birds might just work out on its own.
Apple doesn't invite Kaspersky Lab to examine Mac security (Updated)
Update: Engadget smelled something funny in this story, and turns out they were right; Kaspersky is now saying that the comment about "working with Apple to analyze OS X" was taken out of context, and that Apple has not invited the security firm to analyze its desktop OS. Full statement is here. The CTO of computer security firm Kaspersky Lab says was quoted as saying that Apple has asked them to take a look at Mac security, and the malware targeting it. Nikolai Grebennikov says that the "Mac OS is really vulnerable," and that the company's "first investigations show Apple doesn't pay enough attention to security." Go figure -- the head of a security firm claiming that people should spend more money and time on security. Who knew? But the recent small outbreaks of malware targeting Macs gives a little more credence to these claims, and if Grebennikov (whose firm has publicly gone after Apple on this before) is to be believed, then Cupertino is finally ready to hear about possible improvements. Grebennikov agrees that there hasn't been any iOS-specific malware spotted yet, but he says we'll probably see it in the next year or so. Hopefully, if Kaspersky is working with Apple, they'll be able to keep the OSes completely secure anyway. [via MacRumors]
TUAW Deep Thoughts: How netbooks conquered the universe
Look around out there. Netbooks are not only ubiquitous, they have basically conquered all of reality. Before you do a spit take and start saying words that are unsuitable for TUAW's family friendly audience, let me remind you of Apple's iPad introduction. Steve Jobs laid out the plan for how the unit would operate: as a middle ground between laptops and mobile phones, it would allow people to browse the web, check for email, enjoy media, play games, and read. In other words, Jobs was introducing netbooks for the rest of us. Reimagining the form factor but not the functionality brought the netbook into huge demand (and basically put paid to the more traditional keyboard/screen layout). For a few hundred dollars, people could do all the basic computing they want while on the road, with insanely great battery life, and with an OS that's built for serial unitasking, in a super-comfortable form factor. Basically, Apple built a better netbook and it triumphed. This kind of appliance computing experience hides complexity from the user with minimum compromise. The user experience allows people to do certain tasks slickly, simply, and effectively. The focus isn't on ultimate flexibility, it's on convenience. Netbook computing is all about the appliance experience -- it does its job and just that job. The result was that the iPad exploded. The demand for it showed a basic truth. People liked a simple unit that even a baby or cat could operate. They could still all do the core tasks they had done on standard computers, but they could do it on the go without any training and with a unit that fit into the crook of their arm. The big question that remains is: What next? Can Apple migrate its iPad/netbook lessons to other platforms? Could we see an appliance desktop or notebook next? As I wrote in an earlier post, I think we're likely to see a computer that adapts to its situation -- on the road or at home or in the office. But while we've seen the mobile side of this story, how might home computing change? Will OS X take netbook lessons from the iPad? Some readers responded to my last post by suggesting that anyone incapable of fully operating OS X should not be using it. But when has Apple left potential customers on the table? Why shouldn't they re-jigger OS X (or a version of OS X) to create the same kind of netbook experience demonstrated by Steve Jobs at the top of this post? After all, those tasks are what most people do. Sure, there are professional users as well who would not benefit from appliance computing, but there are plenty more currently struggling away on Windows who could easily make the jump to a simplified iMac (or even Apple TV) if the choice were offered to them. Netbooks and the iPad taught us this: if the hardware is affordable, light, easy-to-use, and helps people accomplish their core tasks, the customers will be there to buy them.
Analyst: SWTOR caused Dragon Age III delay
There's been a lot of discussion following the recent EA earnings report in which the company announced that Star Wars: The Old Republic has 1.3 million subscribers, down from its previous 1.7 million mark. We've heard from the fans, the critics, and the studio itself -- now it's time for the analysts to contribute their side of the conversation. According to Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter, EA's investment in SWTOR has caused a delay in other projects at BioWare, particularly in Dragon Age III's case. The analyst noted that Dragon Age III's expected release window was delayed, and he says this is due to the enormous undertaking of SWTOR. "We believe that a significant portion of the BioWare team responsible for the game was reassigned to Star Wars in order to create content and fix bugs to keep the game's audience engaged," Pachter said. Delay or no, Pachter is upbeat about EA's future, especially in light of the earnings report's news that the company turned a profit. He says that the company will continue to grow, make money, and be a good bet for investors.
The road to OS Xi: Where iOS and OS X suffer a teleporter accident and merge
Remember The Fly? That's the one where Jeff Goldblum tries to teleport but instead gets his genes all mixed up with a fly. "[T]he Telepod computer, confused by the presence of two separate life-forms in the sending pod, merged him with the fly at the molecular-genetic level." Look at Lion/Mountain Lion and iOS; it's easy to see that the two operating systems are growing closer together, starting to converge. If you're willing to put on your crazy hat (tinfoil is optional), you might consider the following thought experiment. What if Apple consolidates the two into a dual-mode OS that supports both mobile and desktop use? Developers have seen OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion pick up numerous mobile features like Game Center, Reminders, and Notification Center. Apple is implementing an iOS-like sandboxing approach to application development with high levels of permission requirements. Apple is integrating share sheets (a UI metaphor that helps users route data from one app to another using a centralized delegation mechanism) in a manner similar to iOS. Even Xcode, the bulwark of traditional "general computing," is being assimilated. Starting this spring, Xcode is now available only through the App Store, distributed in a compliant sandboxed app bundle. When even the main developer IDE for the Mac is subject to the onslaught of the future, Apple's transformation of the Mac OS has few obstacles ahead of it. Sure, Tim Cook has warned us about the fate of the toaster fridge. "I think anything can be forced to converge," he said last week during the Apple Q2 financials call (referring, in this case, to Windows 8 Metro). "The problem is that products are about trade-offs, and you begin to make trade-offs to the point where what you have left at the end of the day doesn't please anyone. You can converge a toaster and a refrigerator, but those things are probably not going to be pleasing to the user." I don't think Cook's statement rules out a unified OS that adapts, depending on the user's situation, instead of forcing users into a single UI for mobile and desktop access. Under the hood, there's already very little separating the core technology of OS X and iOS. I also think Apple is smart enough not to force desktop users into an interface better suited for use on the road, and vice versa. The key isn't creating a chimera that tries to please everyone and suits no one. Instead, I think Apple is capable of delivering a satisfying computing experience that works in multiple environments. Call it "situational computing." It's not as if they haven't explored this arena before. Add in the ever growing importance of AirPlay, which allows interfaces to be wirelessly mirrored outside one device to another display, and iCloud, which sublimates data out from any single device and syncs it to all your computing platforms, and you're diving into an amphibious core technology, one that can adapt to sea or land as needed. (To stretch a metaphor to near-breaking.) In many ways, OS X is "too much computing" for a great proportion of Apple's consumer audience. A simplified user interface would suit many needs, and cover nearly everything users need to accomplish -- although I do believe they need more sophistication than an iPad currently offers. It's just that OS X Lion and Mountain Lion is a bit of overkill. Yes, OS X (and going back to Mac OS 9) offers Simple Finder, but even dropping most of the complexity of the file management environment doesn't change the inter-application experience, which remains fully OS X complex. iOS as it currently stands, however, will never be a perfect solution for students creating research papers. It's designed for serial unitasking, not the multiple research threads and tasks of academic work. Hopping between a text editor and Safari is horrific, and even good apps like Daedalus Touch or Writing Kit at best provide Frankensolutions. In fact, most creative work requires app-to-app switching: creating pictures in Photoshop, editing text in Word, updating spreadsheets in Numbers, and presentations in Keynote. I trust that Apple can create a multi-windowed version of iOS, simplifying the need for a multitasking interface. I also believe Apple can leverage wireless ways to treat every monitor as a potential extra screen. This display outreach feature already exists with Apple TV and AirPlay in current iOS deployments. So why not extend it to all Macs and all displays? The third party Reflection app, which I have been using a great deal since it debuted, provides a hint of the possibilities. That's because AirPlay isn't just about mirroring. It's also about adding extra screens. You already see this in a few games like Real Racing and Bartleby 2. The device acts as the controller, and the AirPlay destination works as a secondary screen. These apps represent just the start of where the technology might take off, especially if Apple introduces a hardware touch-based Apple TV. I should mention that the hardware TV is a possibility that I'm a bit dubious about; others here at TUAW believe in it a lot more than I do. I'm happy to be proved wrong. But think about taking AirPlay to the next level, passively expanding its functionality to offer to transfer control to your iMac or Thunderbolt Display when your iPad comes in range of AirPlay Bonjour services. Imagine redirecting iPad computing to your home screen while sitting at your desktop, with your data and your application state travelling back out with you as you once again hit the road, courtesy of iCloud. Imagine a slide-in laptop shell that transforms the iPad's retina display back to desktop/laptop mode for more intense work sessions when needed. The thing is this: I don't see any big roadblocks preventing this vision from being implemented today, with current tech and current software capabilities. It's as if all the pieces are there already, just waiting for Apple to give the signal to go and productize them. Sure, Cook has warned us away from Toaster Fridges. But do you think Apple has made a habit of developing Toaster Fridges ever? I trust Apple. And I think they could easily go in this direction, delivering high quality consumer technology. When Apple says "No", we hear "maybe." This is not the first time we've gone to the Apple dance. It is classic Apple. They make fun of some tech (netbooks, tablets, whatever) and then they create the definitive version of that device, building something that redefines the market forever. Sure, this entire post is wild speculation -- but remember this: the capacity for implementing this kind of development path is already there. There's nothing I've discussed that's groundbreaking or would require huge R&D. Will iOS and OS X merge into OS Xi? Maybe. Can they? Definitely. Perhaps Apple will surprise me and deliver this unicorn? Possibly. What do you think? Jump in and leave a comment with your thoughts.
Spotify lifts track limits on free accounts, struggles to stand out in streaming market
Good news for European fans of the streaming music service Spotify: The company has lifted the five-track replay limit per day for users of the free service in Sweden, Finland, Norway, the Netherlands and Spain. Additionally, US users will get their current six-month free trial extended, but it's not yet clear just how long that trial will last. Presumably, Spotify is seeing a lot of action from free users, both on the desktop and with its mobile app, and now the company's challenge is going to be to keep these free users around. Personally, I am fully on board with music streaming as the way of the future. I honestly can't remember the last time I downloaded an mp3 and before that, can't remember the last time I actually bought a CD. I've been using Spotify, Pandora, and Slacker, all in different places for different reasons. Among those three, there hasn't been any music that I've wanted to listen to but haven't found. But for each of these companies, their goal going forward will have to be to become the standard. Right now, with each of these competing services, there are reasons for and against using them, with the most likely divider being that one of them is just the one you're used to using, or the one you heard about first. Until they come up with a really clear difference (such as, for example, a really great free program that is somehow monetized in a creative way), we'll continue to see these services struggle to reach a dominant spot. [via TNW]
iOS still holds edge in worldwide tablet shipments, despite Kindle Fire launch
The tablet market heated up in the last quarter of 2011 when Amazon went head-to-head against Apple with its Kindle Fire. Many expected the Fire to make a dent in the sales of the Apple iPad and the latest IDC numbers suggest their expectations were correct. Though overall iPad shipments increased, the iPad's market share fell in the final quarter of 2011 due to the Kindle Fire. IDC says Apple shipped 15.4 million units in Q4 2011, up from 11.1 million units in Q3 2011. This increase was offset by shipments of the Kindle Fire which climbed to 4.7 million units. In the end, Apple grabbed a 54.7 percent market share, down from 61.5 percent in Q3 2011. Amazon grabbed 16.8 percent and became the number one Android tablet maker. Behind the two market leaders are Samsung with a 5.5 percent market share and Barnes & Noble with 3.5 percent. Pandigital, which makes inexpensive Android tablets, rounds out the top five. [Via The Verge]
How to avoid sounding dumb when you write about Apple
So, you want to write about Apple? Lots of people do these days. The company is a household name, its financial performance is virtually unparalleled, and it makes products that millions upon millions of users enjoy every single day. I can tell you from personal experience that getting paid to write about Apple, something I would do on my own anyway, is quite rewarding. But first you have to decide what kind of Apple writer you'll be. Will you be the kind of writer who takes a step back from the linkbaiting Controversy of the Week, calmly and logically analyzes the situation, and then writes objectively about it? Will you keep your BS detector active and not believe every single rumor that blooms on your RSS feed? Will you have the patience and foresight to analyze past trends before predicting future performance, even if it means dragging yourself across a desert of spreadsheets and financial statements? If you're saying to yourself, "Nah, that all sounds like work," and you're not worried about sounding dumb when you write about Apple, then by all means, write whatever comes into your head without putting it through a logic filter first. You'll have absolutely zero credibility among anyone who doesn't actively loathe Apple, but at least your page views will be through the roof. On the other hand, if you'd rather not wind up the laughingstock of the Internet every time you write something about Apple, I have a few points of advice to offer. Leave "fanboy" and the cult metaphors on the cutting room floor I'm declaring a fatwa on the word "fanboy." I've said before that I stop reading any argument that uses the word "fanboy" as soon as I see it, and that remains true. But the word still gets tossed around like a hacky sack at Burning Man, and it's gone from overused and tired to straight out offensive and stupid. I look at people who use the word "fanboy" as an epithet with the same disdain I have for people who use racially-charged insults. Seriously, it's 2012, and Apple has rocketed past Exxon Mobil as the most valuable corporation on the planet. You don't get to that level of success driven along by a handful of dedicated, froth-flecked fans, nor do you achieve what Apple's achieved by having a "cult" of people who will buy what Apple sells no matter what. Think logically for just half a second: Apple sold 37 million iPhones in 3 months. 37 million. If that's a cult, it's one damned huge cult. How many posts do we see about Exxon Mobil "fanboys" or cultlike people mindlessly lining up their cars at Exxon stations and worshipping at the altar of the almighty unleaded octane 92? Exactly none. Because that would be stupid. Whether you like the company and its products or not, Apple is now thoroughly mainstream. Maybe in 2002 you could've gotten away with painting Apple's users with the "cult" brush, but doing so today just makes you sound brainwashed yourself. Don't predict Apple's doom How many times has Apple actually been doomed in the past 15 years? None. How many times have people said Apple is doomed? I bet if you spent all day counting, not only would you not finish, you'd seriously start to question your life and the way you choose to spend your free time. Look at Apple's ledgers, specifically the giant pile of cash it's sitting on, and tell me with a straight face that Apple as a company is going to disappear anytime in the near or even far future. At this point, for Apple to fail or be truly doomed would require close to a decade of deliberate, malicious mismanagement. I'm not saying Apple's "too big to fail" -- Microsoft is moribund proof of how far the mighty may fall when men of vision aren't holding the reins. But if you think that "Apple is doomed" will come true eventually if you just repeat that mantra often enough, I humbly suggest that you instead repeat to yourself, "I won $10 billion in the lottery and the Swedish Bikini Team moved into my guest bedroom." That has a far better chance of happening, and it'll likely be far more personally fulfilling if it does. Now if we're talking about a more specific subset of Apple being doomed, the story's still the same. To this day I can still hear faint echoes of my laughter from 2006 when John Dvorak tried to convince us the Mac was doomed unless Apple switched to Windows. If you thought the iPhone was doomed in 2007 because the thing would just never catch on, then congratulations: you're capable of running Microsoft. If you thought the iPad was doomed in 2010 because it didn't ship with support for Flash Player, then man have they got a gig open for you at Adobe, you scamp. If you thought that either the iPhone or the iPad would be crushed and fade into obscurity because of Android's market share gains in 2010 and early 2011, then... well, maybe we can get you a job corralling the shopping carts at Target. Take Apple's expectations for quarterly revenue and multiply by 1.15 If you intend to write about Apple with the least bit of credibility in forecasting its financial performance, you must follow the company's quarterly performance reports. As a publicly-traded company beholden to its shareholders, Apple quite carefully lays out its expectations for the quarter to come, including factors it expects to impact its performance for good or ill. Being the secretive company it is, Apple doesn't connect the dots for you, but the picture isn't all that hard to comprehend anyway. It can't be, because Apple has a responsibility to the people who've invested in it, and deliberately misleading those investors would get the company into seriously hot water. Apple isn't run by idiots. These are very smart people who know what they're doing. Apple's success isn't a fluke; it's the result of an expertly steered company with some of the best business minds on the planet at the helm. If Apple saw something in the forthcoming quarter that it expected to have a significant impact on its earnings, and there was nothing it could do to avoid that financial iceberg, you can bet it would adjust its financial guidance accordingly. We saw that two quarters ago, in fact, when Apple said it didn't expect great Q4 results due to a "product transition" - i.e., the iPhone 4 hanging around for an extra 3 months. Apple still beat its own guidance but (heavy sarcasm quotes) "missed" Wall Street's expectations. Every quarter, a gaggle of "financial analysts" pull Magic 8-Balls out of their Park Avenue closets, blow off the dust, and forecast financial doom for Apple. "Sell AAPL now," say these people who somehow still have jobs telling others how to invest actual money. To avoid sounding like someone dropped an anvil on your head, here's what you do when it comes time to discuss Apple's financial future. It will require two minutes of research first, where you'll learn what Apple's own revenue guidance for the forthcoming quarter is. Once you have that number, multiply it by 1.15. Use a calculator if you must. That number is about what you can expect Apple to actually return for the next quarter. It sort of takes all the fun out of the earnings announcement, like mathematically determining on Labor Day exactly what you'll get for Christmas, but it sure does stop you from saying stupid stuff like "Apple can't possibly earn $30 billion in revenue in one quarter" when the company turns around and earns $46 billion instead. Keep your product expectations moderate and realistic One surefire way to make yourself sound ridiculous: take any article from Popular Mechanics circa 1950-1960, slightly update the retro-futurist themes to suit the modern era, and tell us Apple will usher in this new age all by itself. Use Siri to talk to your car! Multi-Touch screens on your refrigerator! A FaceTime watch (just like Dick Tracy!!!)! In the leadup to every one of Apple's product announcements, the speculation gets so rampant and so out of control that the only surefire way to separate fiction from reality is to believe none of it. That's essentially what I decided to do two months before the iPhone 4S launched; after overdosing on fever dream rumors of the supposed iPhone 5, I asked myself what Apple was actually likely to do. "Apple's redesigned the exterior of the iPhone twice in four years," I said to myself when my wife wasn't home to stare at me for saying such things aloud. "How likely are they to do another major external redesign just over a year after the iPhone 4 launched?" If you asked yourself this same question and answered, "Not likely in the slightest," then I bet you weren't one of those people beating their chests in early October and screaming, "But it looks just like the iPhone 4! Where is the iPhone 5?! So disappointing, Apple blew it, they're doooooomed!"See also The Rumor That Will Not Die: the Apple-branded HDTV. How to do it wrong: "Apple will introduce an HDTV with a 42-inch LCD screen, FaceTime camera, built-in App Store, and eleventy billion gigabytes of onboard storage. The entire interface will be voice-activated via Siri. The whole thing will cost $1500. It's going to be a total revolution in the way we interact with our TVs, man, you don't even know." How to do it less wrong: "Apple might introduce an HDTV, but for a whole lot of (logical, well-thought out) reasons it sure doesn't seem likely." Apple makes technology that occasionally seems like magic, but as far as I know Apple doesn't employ any actual magicians, sorcerers, or wizards among its design staff in Cupertino. Adjust your product expectations accordingly. Don't try to tell us what Apple "must" do Any time I come across a headline that reads like a gauntlet thrown at Apple's collective feet, I brace for The Stupid. These "Apple Must (x)" headlines usually follow like derp-derp jetsam after the rabble-rabble hurricane of whatever the "-gate" Controversy of the Week happens to be. The iPhone 4 drops signal when held a certain way, so Apple must issue a full recall. The iPhone contains buggy code that causes people's location info to be held for longer than necessary, so Apple must go before Congress and explain itself. Siri doesn't return results for Planned Parenthood when users ask it to find abortion clinics, so Apple must apologize to women everywhere for stealthily promoting a right-wing agenda on reproductive rights. Apple's EULA for iBooks Author says you can only publish iBooks-formatted books on the iBookstore, so Apple must be subjected to antitrust hearings before the week is out. In the increasingly rare respites from storm-in-a-teacup controversy, there's the usual roundup of typically myopic suggestions from "analysts" and the blogosphere at large, all of which manage to sound hilarious in hindsight. Remember when Apple had to put a netbook on the market if it wanted to stay relevant? Or how it had to build an iPhone with a physical keyboard? Or how the iPad had to support Flash Player? Occasionally people do come up with some decent advice for Apple, and I'll find myself nodding along in agreement. But those times are about as rare as sunny days in Cleveland, and just as fleeting before the usual gray, dummkopf skies return. Think first, type later I saved the most important advice for last. Some bloggers are so quick to rush to judgement on absolutely everything Apple does that I often find myself wondering if there's any actual thought behind what they write or if they're just spitting out pure rage like the father character in A Christmas Story. "Apple broke my lamp on purpose! NOTTAFINGA!" We can't go a single week anymore without some "-gate" suffixed scandal surfacing that's supposedly proof everlasting of Apple's nefarious intentions, leading directly to the company's ultimate downfall. Just recently, a simple boneheaded mistake in Apple's writing in the EULA for iBooks Author had bloggers jumping over one another to launch ICBMs full of monkey poo toward Cupertino, with one guffaw-inducing example classifying it as "mind-bogglingly greedy and evil." The only truly mind-boggling thing was the swift rush to judgement without even a breath's pause for logical evaluation of the facts at hand. It was clear to me from the beginning that Apple had no interest in owning anyone's content, only the iBooks format. A week went by, Apple updated the iBooks Author EULA, and people everywhere who don't spend their afternoons sticking pins in an iPhone-shaped voodoo doll looked at the rest of the blogosphere and said, "Duh." So many bloggers (and an exponentially greater number of commenters) are used to seeing Apple as this grand dystopian force in their lives that literally everything the company does must have some mustache-twirling, villainous motivation behind it. That mindset is both sad and dumb. If you're going to write about any topic, but particularly one as widely read about as Apple, for your own sake be sure to think first and type later. If you just take that one small step, everything else I've said here will follow naturally, and the chances of your writing being subjected to eternal ridicule will be much smaller.
Study: iOS apps crash more than Android apps do
Mobile OS crash analysis firm Crittercism (Really? Who's naming this stuff?) has posted the chart above, which shows that as a percentage of crashes overall, the latest version of iOS claims the highest total. In fact, many versions of iOS show a large percentage of crashes, and clearly iOS overall seems more prone to have an app crash rather than Android. Of course, there are quite a few qualifiers here. This data has been normalized, so we can presume that this isn't just a quirk of the numbers: There are likely more crashes happening on iOS devices than Android devices, and not just because there's more iOS apps being used (Crittercism says it monitored about 215 million app launches across all platforms, and there were three times as many launched on iOS, but again, this chart shows a percentage of all app launches). So why more crashing? Crittercism suggests it's because iOS 5.0.1 had just released, while the latest version of Android had not yet arrived, and the new OS was causing more issues than usual in Apple's system. I would also suggest that iPhone users (who have likely paid more for their phones) tend to overtax their devices -- keep in mind this is just an app crashing, not the full iOS, and we've all done that once or twice, right? And as you can see, there's a fair amount of crashes on older iOS phones, which means customers might be running newer apps on older hardware, almost always a recipe for disaster. At any rate, interesting figures. With so much more usage on iOS devices (both from skilled and not-so-skilled developers, and users of both types as well), it's not that surprising that there are so many more crashes. Have crashes on iOS seriously affected your user experience?
Report: XBLA prices rising (slowly), Summer of Arcade review scores dropping
XBLA Fans has done an exhaustive analysis of Xbox Live Arcade sales, Metacritic scores, and trends over the past few years in a four-part writeup. The most interesting finding in the article, in our estimation, is how the perception of rising prices squares with reality. Yes, there are more 1200 point ($15) games being released on the service as compared to previous years, but there are more 800 point ($10) games coming out as well, and there are more of those than $15 games. The average is rising overall, but it hasn't yet reached the 1200 point mark, even if that price is being assigned to some of the more high profile (and high quality) games on the service.The quality of the Summer of Arcade, on the other hand, is dropping overall, according to the average price and Metacritic score. In 2008, the first year the promotion existed, the games had an average Metacritic score of 84.8, with an average price of 960 points. This past year, however, the Metacritic score dropped to 78.8 (which still isn't too bad), but the average price was at 1120. This is purely mathematical, remember: The games are probably more complex these days, which allows Microsoft to set a higher price, and reviews on any site are subjective.Finally, XBLA Fans found 73% of titles on XBLA have gone on sale within their first year, though many of the games on XBLA were only on sale for a day or so. That means that patient XBLA buyers can save a lot of money, if they pay attention and move quickly. There are a few other interesting conclusions in the analysis as a whole, and lots of insight on how Microsoft's Arcade has developed over the past few years.
Lesser-known facts from Apple's earnings statement
The attention-grabbing numbers from Apple's most recent earnings statement have already made the rounds -- US$46 billion in revenue, net profit of $13 billion, 37 million iPhones sold -- and all of that within three months. Apple didn't just turn in record-breaking performance for a tech company; only Exxon has ever managed to have a more profitable quarter than the one Apple just reported. Combing through the spreadsheets on Apple's earnings statement provides some additional insight into the company's overall performance, where its strengths and weaknesses lie, and where the company might be headed in the future. These numbers aren't as headline-grabbing as Apple's profits or unit sales, but they tell an important story all the same. Research and Development In three months, Apple's expenditures on R&D totalled a staggering $758 million. This compares to expenditures of "only" $575 million the year before. To get an idea of how much money Apple's pouring into R&D, compare its three-month expenditures to the production costs of Avatar, one of the most expensive films ever produced. Avatar cost $237 million; in just three months, Apple's R&D expenditures are enough to finance an entire Avatar trilogy. The $575 million in R&D Apple spent in Q1 2011 likely went into the iPad 2, iCloud, the iPhone 4S, iOS 5, OS X Lion, the newest MacBook Air, and a whole host of things we haven't even seen yet. Apple's R&D expenditures for Q1 2012 have increased by an additional $183 million, so the company is still clearly focused on innovating like mad. Mac sales One of the few minus signs visible in Apple's sales data was its North American Mac sales. Though sales were up by 19 percent compared to a year earlier, compared to the previous quarter Mac sales actually declined by 6 percent. North America was the only market to see a decline in Mac sales during the quarter, but at the same time only Europe and Asia Pacific had double-digit growth in Mac sales. Oddly enough, sales of Mac desktops actually seemed to perform better over the quarter compared to portable sales (by trend, not by number of units sold): Desktops Unit sales up 16 percent Revenue up 15 percent Portables Unit sales up 3 percent Revenue up 2 percent Both types of Mac vastly outperformed the year-ago quarter, but the tapering off of portable Mac sales and the overall decline in Mac sales in North America during the Christmas sales period is intriguing. Several factors may explain this phenomenon. First, there were no significant Mac notebook updates during the quarter; the MacBook Pro's late October refresh was quite modest, and the MacBook Air hasn't been updated since July. Second, the mid-2011 discontinuation of the plastic MacBook eliminated Apple's "entry level" offering; the smaller and less capacious 11-inch MacBook Air costs the same as the old MacBook, but it may not be as attractive an offering to budget-minded notebook shoppers. Larger economic factors may have been at play, too; North American shoppers in particular simply may not have had the discretionary funds for a Mac purchase over the holiday quarter. While all of those things likely had an impact on sales of Mac portables, I think what we're really seeing here is the effect of the iPad's cannibalization of the lineup. Over the quarter, the iPad outsold all Mac portables by nearly 4 to 1, and outsold all Macs combined by 3 to 1. Apple has admitted in the past that the iPad has "slightly" cannibalized Mac sales, and classified it as a "nice problem to have." It looks like that so-called "problem" is showing signs of getting worse. None of this is to say that the Mac is in any danger; in a sharp contrast from the rest of the PC industry, the Mac is still seeing unit sales and revenue growths well into the double digits. Whether that trend continues or not is going to depend greatly on the iPad's growth; Tim Cook has said he expects the iPad to eclipse the PC industry eventually, but in terms of both unit sales and revenues, the iPad has already supplanted the Mac after less than two years on the market. iPod sales During its earnings conference call, Tim Cook revealed that the company sold a total of 62 million iOS devices in the past quarter. Subtracting the iPhone and iPad from that number yields a total of approximately 10 million iPod touches sold (assuming Cook wasn't also counting the Apple TV as an "iOS device," that is). This means the iPod touch now accounts for almost two-thirds of all iPods sold; the iPod nano, shuffle, and classic combined are now essentially one drop in Apple's massive bucket. Small wonder, then, that Apple's music-only iPods weren't updated at all this year. The steep year-over-year decline in iPod sales came as no surprise. The iPod reached its all-time sales peak in Q1 of 2009, with 22.7 million units sold. Three years later, the iPod has clearly lost its mojo. With only 15.4 million iPods sold during the holiday quarter, the iPod barely outperformed its sales during the 2006 holidays. Apple sold five million fewer iPods this holiday season compared to the previous year. As a matter of fact, Apple sold more iPads than iPods over the holiday quarter. This is a sharp contrast to the 2010 holiday season, when the iPod outsold both the iPhone and iPad. In late 2010, iPod sales were a few million units higher than the iPhone and exceeded those of the iPad by nearly 3 to 1. In late 2011, the iPad pulled just ahead of the iPod, and the iPhone outsold the iPod by more than two to one. As recently as four years ago, the iPod was by far Apple's biggest cash cow; revenues from iPod sales exceeded even Mac sales by a healthy margin during the 2007 holiday season. iPod sales are rapidly falling, however, making it clear that the device is no longer among Apple's high-priority projects. Given the yearly declines in iPod sales, it's easy to envision a not-too-distant future where the iPod is relegated to niche status. It's unlikely Apple will stop selling the device altogether, as it still addresses markets not served by the iPhone, but the days when the iPod was central to Apple's fortunes are long gone. iTunes Apple's revenues from the iTunes Store, App Store, iBookstore, and iPod-related accessories totalled more than $2 billion over the quarter. Look back to exactly ten years earlier, to the first quarter of 2002; quarterly revenues were a mere $1.375 billion for the entire company. It's long been speculated that the various iTunes-related retail services operate at break-even or, at best, at a modest profit, and the services exist merely to spur growth in Apple's hardware sales. That scenario may have been true years ago, but with a 42 percent year-over-year growth in revenue, iTunes is starting to look like a pretty lucrative business all on its own. Peripherals Apple sold $766 million in peripherals during the past quarter. Again, when you compare that to the company Apple was 10 years ago, the difference is stunning; sales of all Macs combined during Q1 2002 amounted to barely over $1 billion. If Apple's sales of peripherals continue to increase by the same rate, by Q1 2013 it'll be taking in nearly as much money from peripheral sales as it made from the Mac in 2002. If Apple counts the Apple TV among its peripherals, then the device accounted for a fairly significant portion of the overall sales. With 1.4 million units sold during the quarter, Apple's "hobby" would account for nearly a fifth of all peripheral sales. iOS Apple sold 37 million iPhones, 15.4 million iPads, and (going by Tim Cook's numbers as revealed during the conference call) around ten million iPod touches over the holiday quarter. That's a grand total of 62 million iOS devices sold in three months -- all running the latest release of iOS, not some year-old version of it, and all of them virtually guaranteed OS updates for several years. During the last quarter, iPhone sales reportedly exceeded sales of all Android handsets, from all vendors, combined. The iPad continues to utterly dominate the tablet market; Tim Cook reported no measurable impact on iPad sales even after the debut of the most popular Android (forked) tablet so far, the Kindle Fire. Apple earned almost $34 billion in revenue from iPhone and iPad sales -- in three months. Google's revenue for 2011 -- all of Google, for the entire year -- was $37 billion. Clearly, Android is winning. Average revenue per unit sold Comparing Apple's unit sales versus its revenues gives us an opportunity to see, on average, how much money Apple takes in with each sale in each product category. In turn, this gives us a general idea of which items in each category gain the most sales. Desktop Macs: $1309 With 11 different models ranged over the Mac mini, iMac, and Mac Pro, the average selling price of a desktop Mac is $2072. The Mac Pro's high prices drive that average selling price much higher than the actual revenue/unit number, which leads me to believe that sales of the Mac Pro are negligible at best. Looking at the numbers, it seems the 21.5-inch iMac is very likely Apple's most popular desktop model, followed by the 27-inch iMac, then the Mac mini. I would be shocked if the Mac Pro accounted for more than 10 percent of overall Mac desktop sales last quarter. Portable Macs: $1254 The MacBook Air and MacBook Pro combine for a total of 9 different models at an average selling price of $1588. The revenue/unit numbers from Apple's earnings suggest that the MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro account for a majority of Apple's portable sales, with much lower sales for the 15 and 17-inch MacBook Pro models. iPods: $164 The revenue/unit numbers for the iPod line are lower than the lowest-priced iPod touch, but higher than the highest-priced iPod nano. With the iPod touch accounting for at least 50 percent and as high as 66 percent of overall iPod sales, this suggests that the 8 GB $199 iPod touch is Apple's most popular iPod, with significantly lower numbers of 32 or 64 GB iPod touches sold. iPhones: $659 Unsubsidized iPhones range from $375 for an iPhone 3GS up to $849 for a 64 GB iPhone 4S. With five total models on offer, the average sale price across the iPhone line is $634, lower than the actual revenue/unit numbers in Apple's earnings. To perhaps no one's surprise, this suggests the iPhone 4S is Apple's most popular iPhone. Given that the revenue/unit average is slightly higher than the $649 price for an unsubsidized 16 GB iPhone 4S, I'd theorize that while Apple's most popular iPhone is likely the 16 GB iPhone 4S, sales of the more expensive 32 GB and 64 GB models must also be fairly brisk to counterbalance the the (admittedly much less popular) iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4 on the low end. In other words, despite being labelled as a "disappointment" by a tech press weaned on months of rumors about a substantially redesigned iPhone 5, it appears Apple sold every iPhone 4S that came off the assembly line. iPads: $593 Between the Wi-Fi only and Wi-Fi + 3G options, the iPad 2 is available in six models at an average selling price of $664. With the iPad's revenue/unit number falling below that, but still significantly higher than the $499 price of the low-end Wi-Fi model, the numbers suggest that Apple's mid-range iPads are fairly high sellers. Sales numbers of the iPad very likely map closely to the models' prices, with brisk sales of 16 GB models, decent sales for the 32 GB option, and comparatively lower (but still more than satisfactory) sales of the 64 GB iPad 2. Unsurprisingly, the revenue/unit number suggests the Wi-Fi only iPads significantly outsell their Wi-Fi + 3G cousins. Overall To put it mildly, Apple's earnings report shows a company in a very robust state of health. While iPod sales are in steep decline and some segments of Mac sales are showing signs of levelling off, the astonishing uptick in iPhone and iPad sales more than makes up for it. The iPad by itself, in one quarter, brought in more revenue than 230 out of the Fortune 500 companies earn in an entire year. The iPhone by itself, in three months, brought in more revenue than McDonald's made in all of 2010. Apple has $97 billion in cash. It could buy an iTunes copy of the film 2001: A Space Odyssey for everyone on Earth and still have $27 billion left over. How about a potentially better use of its money? After adjusting for inflation, Apple is a little over halfway to being able to finance its own version of the Apollo Program, all by itself. If you cut it down to just one mission, Apple is easily capable of building its own spaceport, developing and building its own launch vehicle, training its own astronauts, and sending a team of humans to the moon and back -- and it would still have tens of billions of dollars left over. Apple may not enjoy this level of success forever, but it's showing no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
