Finding tablet-oriented apps for Android is a hunt, a chore, and a grind.…

Things get even worse when you realize Google Play shows different apps on its website and on individual tablets; even though the Google Play website claims some apps run on an Asus Transformer Prime, the apps didn’t show up on Google Play on the Prime.

And just because an app claims to run on tablets doesn’t mean it was designed for tablets. Often, after you download an app you’ll discover that it’s ugly or nearly useless because it was designed for a 4-inch screen.

via The iPad Wins Because Android Tablet Apps Suck: An Illustrated Guide.

And on and on. This is why Android supporters claiming it’ll overtake Apple in tablets are nuts, dreamers, or wading chest deep into a river in Egypt.

The Android crowd is waiting for non-iPad competitors like the Amazon Kindle Fire or Barnes & Noble Nook to sell in enough quantities to claim “Android tablets” outsell iPads. Setting aside that the Kindle Fire is not even a real Android tablet, these color e-readers don’t compete against the iPad except maybe in the most superficial way. An iPad sale “lost” to one of these is something Apple wasn’t getting anyway.

Android fans will fool no one but themselves and the usual Apple bashing crowd. It’s there own private echo chamber they’re talking to.

Customers were actually having trouble telling the difference between the two screens.

via Watch as Apple customers try to tell the difference between the new iPad & iPad 2 – The Next Web.

I bought the new iPad primarily for the display. I have WiFi only, so LTE meant nothing to me. I knew from the iPhone how useful the Retina Display is over time, especially for reading. There’s a reason I’d frequently still choose to read on that device than my iPad 2. My 50+ year old eyes need all the sharpness they can get.

I believe anybody would get used to the RD over time (which makes it hard to go back), but I also believe the change is something most wouldn’t notice at first glance. Unless you already know, or can appreciate, the ultimate difference a RD makes, or you need LTE, or the extra RAM is important because, say, you want lots of Safari tabs open, save $100 and get an iPad 2 for now. Better yet, save $150 and get a refurbished iPad 2 with the same warranty as a new model. That’s a phenomenal deal.

The money you save can go straight into the fund for the next iPad.

Nokia design chief Marko Ahtisaari is spending a third of his time on creating a tablet for the cellphone maker, which would stand out among hundreds of iPad-challengers

via Nokia working on own tablet: design chief | Reuters.

I guess the other two-thirds of his time is spent on marketing?

Committees just don’t work, and it’s not about price, schedule or a bizarre marketing goal to appear different – they are corporate goals with scant regard for people who use the product.

I couldn’t get the essence of this quote into a tweet.

It perfectly explains why Apple’s competitors are struggling to keep up. “Bizarre marketing goals” are why we have Pico projectors, or 41MP cameras, or styluses, or whatever crammed into new devices. It’s something different for the sake of something different, but it’s no way to build something better.

But Foxconn doesn’t exist solely to produce electronics for Apple. All of the largest Android OEM’s also contract Foxconn to produce their devices in factories in China, Brazil, Mexico, Poland and the Czech Republic.

HTC, Samsung, LG, Motorola, ASUS, Acer, Lenovo and others contract Foxconn to manufacture products for them in the same complex where iPhones are made. Their devices are made by the same over worked, under paid, under age workers, yet none are mentioned in the Business Insider article. None. Not one. Not even Samsung, the sometimes largest smartphone vendor in the world. Just Apple.

The quoted article (and headline) is in response to Henry Blodget’s piece at Business Insider.

I have a problem with that. 

It isn’t that it’s not true, but rather that PC growth vs. Apple is even worse than reported. To see why, let’s look at the chart from Gartner for US “PC” shipments, where the conclusion is that Apple growth increased 20.7% while PC growth declined 5.9%. 

It makes sense until you realize Apple’s (i.e., Mac) data is included in the same total to which it’s being compared. In other words, Apple’s stellar year is propping up the “PC” (i.e., non-Mac) numbers, making “PC” shipments look better than they really were.

If you truly want to know how Apple did in the US on its own against “PCs”, you must subtract it from the latter’s numbers. Here’s what you get: 

• Total 4Q11: 15,854,964
• Total 4Q10: 17,342,605
• 4Q11-4Q10 Growth: -8.5

The originally reported dismal “PC” growth of -5.9% becomes an even more dismal -8.5% without Apple’s numbers propping it up. That -2.6% delta is not insignificant, it’s over 40% worse than what was reported.

IDC’s numbers are also available. As usual, they do not agree completely with Gartner, yet the trend is the same.

Any way you look at it, Apple is exceeding the “PC” growth rate, and if you pull their numbers from “PC” shipments to get a true Mac vs. PC comparson, the latter’s state is revealed to be even worse than it appears at first glance.

the AT&T version of the Samsung Galaxy S II has 42% more screen area and Sprint / T-Mobile versions of Galaxy S II have 58% more screen area than the iPhone 4S.

Ignore that screen sizes are all over the place, and rest assured the Galaxy is huge. Hope you have big pockets. And hands.

The Galaxy S II HSPA+ network speeds are at least 50% faster with AT&T 21 MBPS and three times faster with T-Mobile’s 42 MBPS than the iPhone 4S’s 14 MBPS HSPA network.

Our theoretical you-will-never-see-them speeds are faster than their theoretical you-will-never-see-them speeds. 

Galaxy S II continues to have the thinnest smartphone design 

We’re huge, but a millimeter thinner. 

Open Ecosystem – Consumers can use the Galaxy S II to buy music from Amazon, Rhapsody, or a variety of other music services, as well as multiple cloud music services supported such as Amazon, Google Music and multiple video chat clients available for use including Google Chat and Skype. The Samsung Galaxy S II is not limited to a single manufacturer’s storefront or app store.

The iPhone uses the #1 music store in the world, Galaxy doesn’t. 

In short, until we add a cheap Siri knockoff and a few other features for which we’ll kipe Apple’s icon designs, just ignore the iPhone 4S.

via Digibarn

And even before the Lisa, in 1981 there was the Xerox Star. The link above has a number of high-quality scans of the system. 

The Lisa, introduced in 1983 and featuring a young Kevin Costner in one of the ads, would sell for $10,000, yet that was peanuts compared to the Star: 

The Xerox Star was not originally meant to be a stand-alone computer, but to be part of an integrated Xerox “personal office system” that also connected to other workstations and network services via Ethernet. Although a single unit sold for $16,000, a typical office would have to purchase at least 2 or 3 machines along with a file server and a name server/print server. 

Interesting that in the above shot the printer didn’t get the bullet points you see on the screen. 

Seeing these two predecessors just three years before the Mac’s launch makes you appreciate the littlest Apple all that much more. At $2,500 it was truly remarkable. 

“The court is of the opinion that Apple’s minimalistic design isn’t the only technical solution to make a tablet computer, other designs are possible… For the informed customer there remains the predominant overall impression that the device looks [like the iPad].”

The above is from presiding Judge Johanna Brueckner-Hofman in her verdict.

Forget whether you think the tech world is lawsuit-happy. Forget whether you think this is a bad decision. Forget whether you think this is just Germany, and no other country will rule this way. Forget your Apple hate or Samsung/Android love. Forget all that.

Instead, remember the above quote.

It gets old seeing companies copy Apple so fully, and then claim they had no choice because there’s no other way to make whatever it is they’re making. Of course there is. We’re not talking a single function like a volume switch or camera button, but rather an entire product. If Apple used that lazy cop-out, the iPad would have been built like previous Windows tablet designs and failed miserably.

What Apple did was rethink what a tablet could be, and so could anyone else if they choose. It may then be a success or failure, but it wouldn’t be a copy. 

While the competition peaks at “about average”, Apple passes “better than most” to be “among the best”.

Not sure the word “among” is even necessary.

Yes, there are a lot of problems that need to be solved, but the Macalope doesn’t really see where they’re that much bigger than the ones that supposedly were going to prevent the iPhone’s birth. Maybe it comes out for Comcast at first, like the iPhone with AT&T.

The AT&T iPhone was nationwide in the US, and used a global mobile standard (GSM) so Apple could roll it out in other countries. A Comcast “iTV” would only be regional in the US, and there is no global TV standard so that’s as far as it would get.

The carrier problem was one of control (i.e., dictating hardware, features and services), not getting to market. Apple got around the control with an AT&T exclusivity deal (and AT&T making a bold decision), and the rest is history.

The cable company problem is not about control of the hardware, but rather getting it to market. One GSM iPhone covers many markets across the globe, but for an iTV you’d need nearly as many models as there are markets.

I’m not saying the cable company issue is insurmountable, only that it won’t be solved the way the carrier problem was. They’re not the same problem.

By contrast, Samsung and Motorola try to shut Apple’s products down on the basis of allegedly standards-essential patents, seeking injunctions and (in MMI’s case) an ITC import ban regardless of whether Apple might be willing to pay FRAND royalties. Contrary to making a clear distinction as Nokia did, Samsung and Motorola simply lump standards-related and unencumbered patents together as if all patents were the same.

Interesting read about Apple’s claims that Samsung and Motorola are abusing their FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) patents.

Especially interesting when you consider that Nokia rightly drew a distinction between the two kinds of patents, and Apple settled with them.

Jobs: What I do all day is meet with teams of people and work on ideas and solve problems to make new products, to make new marketing programs, whatever it is. 

Mossberg: And are people willing to tell you you’re wrong? 

Jobs: (laughs) Yeah.

Mossberg: I mean, other than snarky journalists, I mean people that work for…

Jobs: Oh, yeah, no we have wonderful arguments.

Mossberg: And do you win them all? 

Jobs: Oh no I wish I did. No, you see you can’t. If you want to hire great people and have them stay working for you, you have to let them make a lot of decisions and you have to, you have to be run by ideas, not hierarchy. The best ideas have to win, otherwise good people don’t stay. 

Mossberg: But you must be more than a facilitator who runs meetings. You obviously contribute your own ideas. 

Jobs: I contribute ideas, sure. Why would I be there if I didn’t? 

I love the last line. Jobs says it so matter of factly, as if it’s obvious. And it is, to him. But for many people it’s not, they think Jobs is there because he’s Jobs. Period. Yet from his answer you can see that in his mind he’s there because he’s another of the “great people” working at Apple and helping make the decisions about which ideas are best. 

No one denies that the Apple executive team is brilliant, yet it seems many are willing to believe they’re just puppets. I’d argue the two are mutually exclusive. Jobs is right, brilliant people won’t stand for the best idea consistently losing. They’ll leave. I think there’s a reason for this management team’s relative longevity. They like making consistent winners, not being shouted down by seniority or politics and producing failures. 

Samsung Galaxy Tab:

Sales not as fast as expected… a Samsung executive revealed those figures don’t represent actual sales to consumers. Instead, they are the number of Galaxy Tab devices that Samsung has shipped to wireless companies and retailers

HP Touchpad: 

According to one source who’s seen internal HP reports, Best Buy has taken delivery of 270,000 TouchPads and has so far managed to sell only 25,000, or less than 10 percent of the units in its inventory.

RIM PlayBook: 

RIM has quietly cut its sales expectations for the BlackBerry PlayBook after its disappointing sales from the spring

Motorola Xoom: 

New estimates for sales of Motorola’s Xoom tablet–available since late February–are in, but even the most optimistic predictions are scarily small and pale next to the iPad 2′s first-weekend sales numbers.