HP dominates the commodity PC market, selling more beige boxes and plastic laptops than anyone else on the planet, so what’s to stop their upcoming webOS-based HP TouchPad tablet from overtaking Apple’s number one selling iPad to become… um… better than number one? Nothing but wishing it to be so, according to Eric Cador, Senior VP of HP Personal Systems Group of the EMEA.

“In the PC world, with fewer ways of differentiating HP’s products from our competitors, we became number one; in the tablet world we’re going to become better than number one. We call it number one plus.”

We’re huge fans of webOS, and it’s great to see the company aiming high, but the iPad isn’t just “number one”, it’s still so far ahead there’s no clear “number two” at this point. HP first has to release one tablet, make sure that release is competitive with iPad 3 (it’s too late to compete with iPad 2), and offer features, functions, and apps that taken together are compelling enough for someone to buy it instead of an iPad (or for people intent on getting “not an iPad” to choose HP over Android Honeycomb or BlackBerry Playbook tablets).

Given that, and given the comments Roger McNamee made before the ill-fated Palm Pre launch, it might behoove the folks at HP to make sure the TouchPad speaks for itself.

[The Telegraph via PreCentral.net]

Andy Lark, global head of marketing for Dell — and we assume the dude who used to tell dudes they were getting Dells, dude? — decided to talk a little Apple and iPad 2 at CIO Australia. We’d make fun of what he said but unfortunately he beat us to it:

“Apple is great if you’ve got a lot of money and live on an island. It’s not so great if you have to exist in a diverse, open, connected enterprise; simple things become quite complex.”

“An iPad with a keyboard, a mouse and a case [means] you’ll be at $1500 or $1600; that’s double of what you’re paying,” he claimed. “That’s not feasible.”

Wait, what?! Not to get all Macalope on the dude, but let me break out my abacus app and double check that. In Australian dollars, iPad 16GB is $579, BT keyboard is $99, mouse is $0 (no mice for iPad, genius), smart cover is $45… carry the yellow bead… and thats $723. If we bump iPad 2 to the highest end and wrap it it leather, it’s still only $1127.

Easy to see where Lark went wrong. I’ve owned cheap plastic Dells. They cracked and broke and burnt out so much faster than Apple hardware he probably thinks you’ll have to replace your iPad two or three times a year just like he does his hackintoshed Mini. Not so good Lark. (And if one does have a problem the Apple Store will typically swap it out, no need to stay on hold for 97 hours with what simply has to be a robotic customer service center drone on Lost Island that still can’t pass the Turing test. Dude.)

UPDATE: Looks like Microsoft global research and strategy officer, Craig Mundie got a peak at the same talking points, telling the Committee for Economic Development of Australia that he wasn’t sure iPads would remain with us or not.

Whatever could Dell and Microsoft be afraid of, besides not having anything competitive to offer?

[CIO, thanks to Lark for the chance to snark!]

iPad may be cannibalizing laptop sales by as much as half according to Best Buy CEO, Brian Dunn:

Mr. Dunn also said internal estimates showed that the iPad had cannibalized sales from laptop PCs by as much as 50%

It will be interesting to see how much, if at all, they cannibalize iPod and MacBook purchases, and if they’re in it for the long haul or the cannibalization stops when most of the people who want an iPad get one.

[Wall Street Journal]

Apple’s iPad and iPhone are like mutant viruses according to Acer founder Stan Shih, who says they may be difficult to cure now but PC vendors and Google’s Android will isolate and become immune to in the future. (So, basically, the plot from that poorly adapted X3 movie?)

Shih pointed out that Apple deserves to be respected, since it has a completely different strategy than other PC brands. Apple CEO Steve Jobs has always been looking for revolution, while other PC brands evolved naturally and are developing products in a more solid way, Shih commented. But based on the historical experience, a market that evolves naturally will always turn out to be much stronger, according to Shih.

Since iPad is currently putting a hurting on Acer’s netbook business, it stands to reason Shih has ramped up the verbiage. It wasn’t all slings and arrows, PC vs Mac, VHS vs Betamax however:

Shih still praised Apple’s creativity and innovation, especially its highly integrated hardware and software and its completely established online application store and believes its strategy should be a good example for PC brands to learn from. Shih noted that all Apple’s applications are built on a culture of innovation

Good luck trying to cure that.

[Digitimes, thanks Antony!]

UPDATE: TiPb was sent a transcript of the TD Newcrest Technology Conference, including the comments by RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridi, so here they are in their entirety. On tablets:

Well. The trends we’ve been following have been an — there’s been, over the last three to four years, organizations have discovered the value of smartphones clearly, and that’s why we’re here, and that’s what we’re talking. And smartphones are always starting to space the need for laptops, but not all laptops, and not all needs. And I know that there are risks organizations that ask their customers when they join, when get hired, do you want a smartphone or a laptop very few get the opportunity to have both. So I think that’s an important thing, those are differentiated.

So the question you have ask yourself is when it comes to tablet, what market or what opportunities still it’s solving, what problem is it solving, and is it just a replacement laptop. I think that’s a difficult one to judge. But I think again if you look at what’s happening with smartphones are getting bigger, screens are getting bigger and getting more powerful and faster CPUs, more memory, we go in the 4G networks, we’ve got Wi-Fi, it’s just got everything, the operating systems are becoming more, more powerful, the tools are becoming more, more powerful, more applications are being developed, and are being used in more and more both enterprise and consumer spaces. So, I think at this point if you have to take the whole thing into consideration, you can’t say what’s the market for tablets in exclusion of the other devices, you have to put the whole thing together and I don’t think it’s that clear yet.

On touchscreen phones:

Well, I mean, clearly the best thing to do is to provide the choice and let the consumer and the customer to ultimately decide. I think what we’re seeing in the market though is that, it’s not clear if one side fits all and it really isn’t. And you can see it because a lot of people are realizing the incredible value and lifestyle improvement that are well-designed QWERTY push messaging experience brings to table. It’s really, really important. We’re finding — if you look at the surveys, you can see that large amount of the customers that have purchased touchscreen devices in last two years, they intend to get a device with the QWERTY keyboard on it now, right. I mean, they’ve got into a point where they’ve realize that a touchscreen alone is not enough; so that’s important.

I think with the trackpad technology is going into the BlackBerrys now, we provide a gesture and an elegance to control. Again, that’s unmatched. So, I think that is a third dimension, because you talk about touchscreen devices, you talk about QWERTY devices, but I would argue this is third, the whole control, command and control of things like well-designed trackpad technologies. I think, that’s really, really important. And I think, we continue to evolve with the research and invest in the Storm technology to make sure we get those right, we learned a lot and we continue to evolve that platform. I think that again what’s important is we provide that choice and we don’t lose sight of the fact what’s made us famous and what’s driving our sales, which is our QWERTY keyboards and our incredible track [indiscernible].

So not as cut and dried but we still have to wonder what surveys he’s reading that say people want to swap their touchscreens for QWERTYs because they’re not the ones we’re seeing.

And again, Apple’s sold 85,000,000 iPhone OS devices — including iPhone, iPod touch, and now iPad — to date.

[ORIGINAL STORY: Electronista via DF]

In response to the Wall Street Journal’s rumor last week about the iPhone being released on Verizon later this year, CEO Ivan Seidenberg remarked to the Council on Foreign Relations:

[Verizon] has told Apple that it wants to carry the iPhone. But he declined to say when — or even if — the popular smart phone will be available for Verizon Wireless customers.

Seidenberg is infamous for reportedly refusing the back in 2007, leading Apple to partner with AT&T, and for once saying Verizon’s strategy for competing with the iPhone involved waiting for Steve Jobs to get old.

We’re not getting our hopes up for an iPhone 4.0 event “one more thing” yet, however those three iPhone G4 (not iPhone 4G!) model numbers have us wondering about July-September, you?

[Reuters via MacRumors]

Prior to Steve Jobs laying into Google and Adobe, Google, Nokia, Microsoft, and Nintendo got their shots in on Apple and the iPad, and here’s what they had to say:

• Google CEO Eric Schmidt: “You might want to tell me the difference between a large phone and a tablet.” [via Business Insider]

Someone might want to tell him people are making Android tablets, or is he still using BlackBerry?

• Nokia social point-main Mark Squires: In a post titled, “A fruit confused”, he takes issue with Apple calling itself the world’s largest mobile devices business (measured by revenue). [via Nokia Conversations]

Fair enough, considering there are lies, damn lies, and statistics, but the title of the post… really?

• Microsoft director of product management in the developer platform, Brandon Watson: “developers of applications for the iPhone OS–which the iPad uses–are not making money. Developing applications for the iPhone and iPad is expensive, he said, because iPhone OS uses the Objective C language rather than Microsoft’s more pervasive .NET platform. And Apple’s control over the platform has alienated some people that make software for its products, he said.” [via Technologizer]

Cue Windows Mobile millionaire dev and their 140,000 runtimes in 5… 4… 3… 2…

• Nintendo President Satoru Iwata: ‘It was a bigger iPod Touch. I question whether those features would be enough to get people to buy new machines.” [via NYT]

Never mind his own company just released a bigger version of their own, the Nintendo DSi LL… He’s missing the same point many others are likewise missing. The iPad isn’t just a big iPod touch. The iPad is a big iPod touch. That’s its killer feature.

And yes, we’ll be saving all these comments, and any others we come across, and looking back at them one year post-iPad launch to see if it works out any better for the competition than it did when the iPhone was mocked in 2007…

[Thanks to everyone who sent these in!]

According to an anonymous source in attendance at Apple’s recent, internal iPad town hall meeting at the Cupertino campus, Steve Jobs answered some employee questions by saying “Adobe is lazy” and that Google’s “don’t be evil” motto was “BS”. Wired reports:

On Google: We did not enter the search business, Jobs said. They entered the phone business. Make no mistake they want to kill the iPhone. We won’t let them, he says. Someone else asks something on a different topic, but there’s no getting Jobs off this rant. I want to go back to that other question first and say one more thing, he says. This don’t be evil mantra: “It’s bullshit.” Audience roars.

About Adobe: They are lazy, Jobs says. They have all this potential to do interesting things but they just refuse to do it. They don’t do anything with the approaches that Apple is taking, like Carbon. Apple does not support Flash because it is so buggy, he says. Whenever a Mac crashes more often than not it’s because of Flash. No one will be using Flash, he says. The world is moving to HTML5.

Wired points out that, by getting around the App Store pocket veto and delivering Google Voice for iPhone via an HTML5 web app, Jobs should be careful what he wishes for. Google maps data and YouTube were shown off during the iPad launch, as was PDF support, though no Flash (despite some ad-related confusion).

More than a battle of words, however, this is a battle for control of the consumer internet experience — and the tremendous revenue that comes with it.

MacRumors brings a few more details on that:

• Apple’s next iPhone is an “A+” update, and Android won’t be able to keep up with Apple’s aggressive pace.
• iPad, iPhone, and Mac are the most important products Jobs has been a part of.
• Lala was a talent acquisition to bring their people into iTunes.
• 2010 Macs will take Apple to the “next level”
• Blu-Ray is still a bag of hurt, so Apple is still waiting on it.

An “A+” update for the 4th generation iPhone, eh? Bring it on!

Engadget confronted Android Founder Andy Rubin — by all accounts a brilliant and passionate guy who really wants to make great products — about why the US versions of the Droid and Nexus One don’t use the Android 2.0 supported multitouch keyboard and gestures, while the non-US versions do. The response:

“It’s not an America versus outside America kind of thing. It’s a decision that is a result of the OEM model. I personally don’t like two-handed operations… there is no conspiracy.”

Both TiPb (because Apple’s name keeps come up on the suspect list) and our sibling site, Android Central have been covering this story and it still makes the kind of sense that doesn’t. “Like” or “dislike” seems an odd way to talk about something that so affects usability (pinch-to-zoom is intuitive and ingrained enough that it should just be a standard). There were rumors that Google didn’t want to violate Apple’s multitouch patents in the US, but Engadget looked and couldn’t find any that applied to these specific implementations.

Perhaps, as otherwise rumored, there’s a gentleman’s agreement between Apple and Google, and since Google’s CEO, Eric Schmidt was on Apple’s board of directors (even though he reportedly recused himself from iPhone discussions), Google could be playing it extra super safe.

Whatever the answer is, however, the founder not liking something is an odd answer as to why it doesn’t exist only in his own country. Remember, RIM’s CEO doesn’t like typing on glass and even he made the BlackBerry Storm…

Did Palm’s Joe Rubinstein say he’s never, not once ever touched an Apple iPhone. Not in 2.5 years. Not one? According to Digital Daily, that’s just exactly what he said.

Now we don’t think everyone has to have at least tried an iPhone, but when you’re the CEO of another smartphone company these days, especially when you’re a CEO who came from Apple, where you were the “father of the iPod”… frankly we have a hard time believing this is anything other than a misquote or misinterpretation of what he said. Even though there’s doesn’t seem to be much room for either –

“We don’t pay that much attention to Apple….I know it sounds really strange,” says Rubinstein.

“Really?” Kara replies. “You don’t worry about the iPhone?”

“No, I really don’t,” Rubinstein answers.

“I don’t believe you,” says Kara, telegraphing a sentiment I imagine is widely held among the audience.

Rubinstein: “I don’t have an iPhone. I’ve never even used one.”

I think I just heard Palm’s entire PR team audibly groan.

According to Gizmodo, he lacks the Sun Tzu. Our guess? He’s got an iPod touch.

Not sure if it’s the year winding down, or malaise with alternatives, but a variety of sites have begun once again re-listing the quotes of competing executives who doubted Apple or the iPhone had potential, staying power, or even any chance for success what-so-ever. 3 generations, 40 odd million units, 100,000 applications, and 2 billion downloads later, these revisitations include:

• Gizmodo’s Top 5 Assclowns Laughing at the iPhone Back in 2007
• AAPLinvestors iPhone Death Watch
• Daring Fireball’s ongoing Claim Chowder series [Google search link]

(TiPb typically files such things under CEOh Snap)

AT&T CEO Ralph de la Vega stated that his carrier’s exclusive agreement to sell Apple’s iPhone in the US… will end one day. Of course, we knew this. You knew this. AT&T and Apple knew this. Everybody knew this, because they’ve said it before. Still, on the eve of a highly successful quarterly results report, where the iPhone once again carried the day for AT&T earnings, they obviously felt the need to say it again:

“We have a legacy of having a great portfolio…that will continue after the iPhone is no longer exclusive to us. We think we will continue after the iPhone…to drive [results]….” [...] “we feel really good about our non-iPhone [subscriber] adds and net adds…. We feel really strong about our portfolio in quick messaging devices, including BlackBerry and all the smartphones.” [...] “Even if we lose exclusivity [of the iPhone], we will be the only carrier with HSPA 7.2 [a network specification being deployed at AT&T] and [new devices] will work on our network faster. I feel as strongly as ever [about] the capability of devices in our lineup and [am] super-excited about the deals with e-readers and personal navigation devices.”

Apparently, like Verizon, AT&T will seek post-iPhone solace in much more carrier-control friendly Android…

[Via Macworld]

Steve Ballmer, whose company produced the single most internet-hostile program in history — Internet Explorer 6 — has the stupefying temerity to state:

Let’s face it, the Internet was designed for the PC. The Internet is not designed for the iPhone. That’s why they’ve got 75,000 applications – they’re all trying to make the Internet look decent on the iPhone.

Okay, Granted, Ballmer is likely looking at that Internet through a “compatibility-mode” colored screen, locked into SilverLight or ActiveX plugins, with ill-rendered box models and complete lack of support for anything approaching modern HTML5, and CSS support, so he probably doesn’t notice that stuff actually rendered using Web standards (Wikipedia it, Steve!) looks just fine on the iPhone.

Since Windows Mobile 6.5, brand new in 2009, uses Internet Explorer 6′s previous-century rendering engine (spare us the — it’s not the same as desktop IE6 — a poor browser by any other name hurts the web as badly), and Outlook 2010 (!) is transitioning to Word as its HTML email renderer (?!) we’re sure he has no clue what the internet is supposed to look like anyway.

But still, even for Ballmer, this is one ham fisted quote. The reason the iPhone has 85,000 apps is because it’s a modern, highly usable mobile device that developers want to develop for.

(For the record, what became the modern Web was designed on NeXT, the precursor to Apple’s OS X, the mobile version of which powers the iPhone, with computing power and screen real-estate we’re guessing might just be competitive with desktop power a couple decades old. B’okay Steve?)

[AP via Business Insider via Gizmodo]

During Apple’s Q4 2009 financial results conference call today, when asked about competitive smartphone platforms and devices, Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook responded:

Frankly, they are really just trying to catch up with the 1st iPhone that was announced 2 years ago

While many will no doubt argue — perhaps laugh outright — at that, it’s harder to laugh at Apple’s results to date: 7.2 million more iPhones sold in the last 3 months, and half-a-billion more App Store downloads during the same period.

So was Cook just showing his swagger, setting himself up for a big takedown, or comfortably settling into a combined iPhone/iTunes/App Store offering his thinks will be tough to beat in the consumer market?

Sprint CEO Dan Hesse was put on Charlie Rose’s hot seat and asked the pointed question: “Is the Palm Pre making a dent into the iPhone market?”

Hesse’s response?

Aaah… It’s-it’s doing well, but you can almost put the iPhone, to be fair, in a separate category. The Apple brand and that device have done so well, it’s almost not… it’s like comparing someone to Michael Jordan.

Gizmodo figured they’d remind Hesse that it was, in fact, the same category and that Apple needs competition (the consumer needs competition). Engadget thinks it was a duly respectful and tactful acknowledgement of the iPhone’s success.

We think it’s nice to hear a wireless CEO who’s not so bombastic and, frankly, disconnected as most of them seem to be, as evident by Hesse’s answers on Android, Nextel, the price of touchscreen handsets, and battery life as an impediment to smartphone growth.

As Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was taking the stage for a private company meeting at Seattle’s Safeco Field, he saw an employee about to snap his picture with… an iPhone. So, Ballmer decided to snap instead. TechFlash (via Engadget) reports he grabbed the iPhone from the hapless employee, began making “funny comments”, put the iPhone on the floor and pretended to stamp on it, and then continued on, only to remind the employee he hadn’t forgotten about him later.

Maybe Ballmer should just forbid iPhones at Microsoft the way Bill Gates forbids them at home? Or, you know, get Windows Mobile back in order and make a phone so good no one at Microsoft would want to use anything else?

Of course, if it had been an Apple event, and Steve Jobs had caught one of his employees rocking an Windows Mobile device, no doubt Jobs eyes would have glowed and Omega Beams would have shot out and fried the poor soul on the spot.

(Yeah, we know Apple Store employees all use Windows CE devices to process credit card transactions, shhhh!).

Apple PR has just announced that Dr. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google and member of the Apple board of directors since August 2006, is resigning that position.

“Eric has been an excellent Board member for Apple, investing his valuable time, talent, passion and wisdom to help make Apple successful,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “Unfortunately, as Google enters more of Apple’s core businesses, with Android and now Chrome OS, Eric’s effectiveness as an Apple Board member will be significantly diminished, since he will have to recuse himself from even larger portions of our meetings due to potential conflicts of interest. Therefore, we have mutually decided that now is the right time for Eric to resign his position on Apple’s Board.”

This comes on the heels of Schmidt announcing he would “talk with Apple people”, and on the controversial rejection of Google Voice and Google Latitude applications from the App Store, both now constrained to WebApp status on the iPhone and iPod touch.

Schmidt already recused himself from meetings involving the iPhone, which with 5.2 million sold last quarter and an platform install base in excess of 45 million, was increasingly core to Apple’s business, even as Google began to explore the platform space themselves.

No word on who, if anyone, will replace him (though Apple’s own chief operating officer, Tim Cook, has widely been rumored as a potential board member for a while now).

More specifically, Palm’s biggest cheerleader at financial backer, Elevation Partner, Roger McNamee famously gaffed that:

“You know the beautiful thing: June 29, 2009, is the two-year anniversary of the first shipment of the iPhone,” McNamee said today in an interview in San Francisco. “Not one of those people will still be using an iPhone a month later.”

Well, today is July 29, 2009 — two years later and a month later. Given that Apple sold 5.2 million iPhones last quarter, and AT&T activated 2.5 million of those babies, we’re leaning towards a number somewhat higher than “not one.”

Hey, maybe that’s what he meant? Quite clearly, “millions” means “not one”… right?

(Note: Palm did retract McNamee’s hyperbole with a speed that would make Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer Open-Mic Reaction Team (SBOMRT) envious.)

Speaking at Fortune’s Brainstorm tech conference, AT&T CEO, Randall Stephenson, discussed the iPhone and it’s exclusivity with AT&T.

“There will be a day when you are not exclusive with the iPhone.”

Nothing was discussed regarding any negotiations that may be taking place at this time between the two companies but be assured that AT&T will do everything and anything in it’s power to keep Apple’s device under lock and key for as long as it possibly can.

All good things must come to an end, however. With that being said, AT&T’s exclusitivity deal with Apple’s iPhone is no different. It will eventually end. Sure there are those of you out there that can’t wait until Apple breaks free of it’s chains from AT&T, just don’t count on that happening anytime in the near future.

[Via Engadget Mobile]

When he’s not borrowing CrackBerry Kevin’s personal handset to snap quick pics and give Android Cassey conniptions, Google CEO Eric Schmidt is responding to reporters about his role as a member of Apple’s Board of Directors in light of Google entering the operating system space — again:

“I’ll talk to the Apple people. At the moment, there’s no issue,”

Since Google Chrome OS is little more than announce-ware at this point (or, “darn, we should have made webOS instead of Android?), that may be true, but it’s hardly a tenable situation going forward. What this will mean to Apple/Google relations is unknown. Though right now the iPhone clearly benefits from Google data pipes, especially in the Maps app, how much do they benefit from Schmidt being on the board?

Our guess? Schmidt was using that BlackBerry camera to zoom on the unlicensed Mercedes — and glaring Steve Jobs — that’s been shadowing him since Tuesday, and carefully penning his resignation letter…

[via Macrumors]

Sprint and the Palm Pre just decided to bring it to Apple’s iPhone via a perfectly nifty, if factually inaccurate(1), little ad-esque banner posted on Facebook. PreCentral.net already pipped us to the relevant quote post, citing McNamee’s infamous CEOh-snap moment from the past:

You know the beautiful thing: June 29, 2009, is the two- year anniversary of the first shipment of the iPhone, [...] Not one of those people will still be using an iPhone a month later.

The relative thriftiness of constraining their marketing budget to a Facebook fan-base aside, does it really behoove Palm to remind iPhone 2G owners that their contracts are up, right after 1,000,000 people jumped on the iPhone 3GS last weekend alone?

How does that compare to Palm Pre numbers to date?

(utter silence)

That’s what we thought…

1. The iPhone multitasks iPod, Mail, Phone, Safari iTunes, and App Store, phenomenally well — the iPhone 3GS more snappily than the arguably laggy Palm Pre. Apple simply chooses not to allow 3rd party multitasking at this point, something that admittedly chaffs, but is still a far cry from what’s insinuated in the “ad”.

It’s been suspected for a while now, but PreCentral.net let us know that Palm has gone and made it all official-like:

Palm, Inc. (Nasdaq: PALM) today announced that its board of directors has appointed Jon Rubinstein to lead the company as Chairman and CEO upon the departure of Ed Colligan, who is stepping down after sixteen years of leadership at the company. Rubinstein, who joined Palm as Executive Chairman in October 2007 to help bring innovation back to the company, assumes his role as CEO on June 12. Colligan plans to take some time off, then join Elevation Partners.

As mighty Zeus did before him, Rubinstein came from Apple to slay the titans of Palm past and bring a powerful new pantheon of WebOS devices into their own.

So the former head of iPod hardware becomes the new head of Palm every-ware, and Ruby brings his vision of the iPhone-come-Pre head-to-head with the actual iPhone — and more interestingly — his once and former master, Steve Jobs.

Best of luck!

Meanwhile, TiPb would like to bid a fond farewell to Ed Colligan, who helped found the very industry we hold so dear. Many of us have owned many Palm Pilots and Visor and Palm Treo devices (and Dieter likely still has every single one of them on his desk!) and each was wonderful and innovative in its own time. Enjoy your much-earned respite and here’s wishing health, happiness, and much success with your future endeavors.

Standing ovation

(And who knows, a year from now Colligan might just pop up at RIM with a new OS of his own — how’d that be for poetry?)

Seriously, I’m beginning to heart RIM’s co-CEOs almost as much as I heart Steve Ballmer. Give the mobilemen a venue and a mic, and we get blog gold each and every time. Chronology will help context here:

Mike Lazaridis on touch screen devices:

THERE’S a reason that R.I.M. is averse to the iPhone’s glass pad. “I couldn’t type on it and I still can’t type on it, and a lot of my friends can’t type on it,” says Mike Lazaridis, R.I.M.’s co-chief executive and technological visionary. “It’s hard to type on a piece of glass.”

This almost the very moment word leaked that RIM was set to release an “Apple Killer” which became the lamentably launched BlackBerry Storm. When reviewers and users alike generally panned the device’s initial, buggy software, Jim Balsillie said GlitchWare was the new Black(Berry):

[RIM and Verizon] made the crucial Black Friday deadline “by the skin of their teeth,” after missing a planned October debut. Mr. Balsillie said such scrambles — and the subsequent software glitches that need to be fixed — are part of the “new reality” of making complex cellphones in large volumes.

Now to put the disrespect cherry high atop of Storm owners frustration sundays, Lazaridis returns with this brain-boggler:

“That’s our first touch product, and you know nobody gets it perfect out the door. You know other companies were having problems with their first releases.”

The iPhone was Apple’s first touch product, and while iPhone 1.0 may have been limited in functionality (and 3.0 may still have boxes yet unchecked), it’s hard to take anyone seriously who doesn’t think Apple not only nailed their first touch product, but their very first phone product of any kind.

Maybe because 1) Apple wasn’t rushing for a Black Friday sales-focused deadline, 2) they weren’t trying to clone a competing device’s feature set, and 3) they cared about user experience more than 1) or 2)?

Many people still use an original iPhone 2G, some even still run iPhone OS 1.x. Storm owners have only themselves to blame for not waiting to buy Storm 2 instead? Ahem. Pitchforks to the right, torches to the left, north to Waterloo!

That said, if Dancing with the Canadian Stars ever becomes a reality, I would still vote for RIM’s co-CEO to take on the Woz role. Let the Laz dance! Ballmer could lend him the Monkey Boy choreography and we just know CrackBerry Kevin would bring out the push-powered voters!

(via Engadget, headline via Jeremy on Twitter)

We have to wonder if Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has some insidious plot to make his PR people pull their hair out, so they’ll look just as Fester’ian as he himself. Or maybe he’s just jealous of the love TiPb’s been giving Palm’s Roger McNamee lately? How else can you account for the glorious (for bloggers!) content he keeps spewing in our general direction?

What now? From the man who once said the iPhone would be the most expensive phone on the planet (guess he didn’t see the Windows Mobile Xperia X1a going for $800…), now comes the following, courtesy of WMExperts:

“Windows Mobile 6.5 has touch on it. The way Apple does touch drives cost. [The] way they do it on the iPhone is not an inexpensive component. We’ll do it in a way that you can afford to do it on most phones.”

Bu-bu-bu-but…! We thought WinPho was all about choice? Shouldn’t manufacturers like HTC, who’ve made capacitive touch screen devices like the Android G1 (which is hardly that expensive!) have the choice to offer WinPho devices with capacitive touch?

So not only does Ballmer try to spin Microsoft’s abject failure to deliver on capacitive touch 2 years after Apple (and months after Android and even BlackBerry) as a cost saving feature, but for extra bonus bluster, claims Apple is “driving cost” on the $199 iPhone?

Next time, stick to dancing…

Ouch! According to PreCentral.net, Palm has just given uber-investor Roger McNamee the PR equivalent of the Price-is-Right FAIL buzzer. Bum-Bum-Ba-Bum-Bowwwwwwww…

Much of it is numbers and analyst based, but a few gems glare out, especially #5, #8, and #9. Words like “premature” and “withdrawn” are used. Double ouch.

Read the whole post for a great daily dose of schadenfreude.

Of course, it wasn’t all bad news for Palm yesterday: Engadget editor-in-chief Josh Topolsky hit Late Night with Jimmy Fallon to show off the Pre, and show techies are comedy gold as well.

No sooner did we report the outlandish statement from Palm backer Elevation Partners head-geek Roger McNamee that come June, every iPhone 2G owner would ditch the platform and AT&T to become Pre-verts on Sprint, than our sibling site PreCentral.net went and updated.

Seems McNamee thinks iPhone Mobile Safari ain’t all that, compared to the Pre (even though the Pre uses Apple’s open-source WebKit foundation — which we know comes from KHTML/Konquerer…):

“Our product is just going to run rings around them on the web. If you want to go the web, it’s going to be a million time faster, well, not a million times, several times faster and that’s a huge deal for most people.”

Really? And since Sprint can’t do simultaneous voice and data, the minute you answer a call, your speed drops to zero. How much faster is that?

Apparently, however, McNamee’s hurt turns to heart for Apple’s Mac platform:

I’ve been an apple fan for years and I would never use any other kind of computer!

Bulletin: Some may just feel the same about the iPhone, b’okay Roger? See the whole crash-and-burn on video at Bloomberg…

Hey, it’s nice to see Palm getting back into the game! No, not with their admittedly compelling — if Apple inspired — Palm Pre handset set to land sometime in the first half of 2008. But with their rhetoric. You know, the same rhetoric that had Palm CEO Ed Colligan, when asked about the iPhone before it’s launch say, Apple wasn’t just going to walk in and figure smartphones out.

This time time it’s not Colligan however, but Palm uber-financier and Bono-buddy Roger McNamee, he of the coolest utility belt since Batman, who’s firing the mouth-cannon Apple’s way. McNamee tells Bloomberg (via Daring Fireball):

“You know the beautiful thing: June 29, 2009, is the two-year anniversary of the first shipment of the iPhone,” McNamee said today in an interview in San Francisco. “Not one of those people will still be using an iPhone a month later.”

Not one? Really? We’re certain some die hard Palm faithful and curious technophiles will become Pre-verts come launch day (we even suspect an editor-in-chief we know might just be waiting in line already…) but not one?

Given Apple’s statement that June is also iPhone product cycle, and that the Pre has fairly shamelessly glommed Apple’s iPhone style — and several high profile members of the iPhone development team — we’re certain Steve Jobs won’t make it a point to have a shiny new iPhone 3.0 ready for just about the same time, so that original iPhone owners have an easier, maybe even moe compelling upgrade path available. Can’t see that happening, can we…?

TiPb. Heart. Steve. Ballmer. Microsoft’s #2 has really become #1 in our CEOh-Snap department. See, he doesn’t just hit the mic, he pummels it to bloody, infuriating, borderline committable pulp. This time, however, D|All Things Digital brings us a little CEOh-Snap back in the form of Ballmer being on the receiving end for once, via an unhappy questioner at the CIO Summit:

“With platforms like the Google phone and iPhone coming out, it’s really tough to continue to stand behind Windows Mobile when our employees are bringing these consumer devices into our environments,” the questioner explained. “And in your presentation you put Windows Mobile right in the center there, but it was a phone that doesn’t work in America and an operating system that you haven’t released. I’m wondering what your commitment is to continuing to get newer versions of the operating system in our hands so that we don’t have to fight this battle on the ground.”

Ballmer’s come back? WinPho 6.5 this year is significant but not everything they want for higher-end phones; that’ll come next year(!) with WinPho 7. Microsoft is accelerating their efforts, and people still bought more Windows Mobile devices than iPhone last year anyway, so: nyah!

(Though we’d remind Mr. Ballmer that Apple’s international roll-out really only began in July 2008, more than half-way through the year, and he’s welcome to check the sales numbers for Q3 2008 to see how that worked out for everyone…)

Microsoft PR must hate it every single time CEO Steve Ballmer gets on a mic. Bloggers on the other hand…? From the latest analyst briefing:

“The truth of the matter is all the consumer market mojo is with Apple and to a lesser extent BlackBerry. And yet, the real market momentum with operators and the real market momentum with device manufacturers seems to primarily be with Windows Mobile and Android.”

Um.. Apple and BlackBerry manufacture their own devices there Steve, so while their internal momentum is enough to steamroll an industry, ODM’s can’t get their hands on iPhone OS X or RIM’s OS no matter how badly they probably want to.

Apple Insider rightly points out, of course, that this is the same line Microsoft used about the iPod when promoting their own PlaysForSure DRM platform (which later became closer akin to PlaysNoMore).

Check out Apple Insider‘s full coverage to get Ballmer’s views on Apple’s Mac, Google, Android on Netbooks vs. Windows 7, and how Microsoft could be like RCA! (?!)

Engdget Mobile scored an interview with Ralph de la Vega, CEO of AT&T Mobility. Our favorite carrier CEO (for recently telling Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer, Nokia’s CEO, and Euro-haters that “99.5 percent of the industry is trying to copy the iPhone”), shot from the hip on a wide range of issues, including AT&T outages, reports of iPhone reception problems, the success of the App Store, and the competitive landscape now that Google and Palm are (back) in the game.

Perhaps the best news for iPhone users on AT&T? He anticipates future firmware updates will continue to increase reception and reliability:

They’re continuously looking for, and we communicate with Apple and say, you know, if we tweak this it would work better, so they’ve been very good about working with us and making sure that as we look at things to do the drop calls there, they’re going to implement it.

Strangely, no word on dropping data rates or throwing in tethering gratis…

UPDATED: Daring Fireball nails it. Closed or open, the smartphone industry was stagnating before the iPhone…

ORIGINAL: Steve Ballmer is the gift that just keeps on grief’ing! Proven wrong about the iPhone already, both the Microsoft CEO and his counterpart at Nokia, Olli-Pekka Kallasvu both decided to take fairly transparent jabs at Apple, who once again didn’t even bother to attend the show. CNet (via MacRumors) has the gory details.

Said Kallasvu (taking a break from iCloning the iPhone App Store):

Apple’s vertically integrated model, where its hardware and software are tightly controlled by the company, further fragmented the market. And he added that what is truly needed is more openness in developing applications.

Said Ballmer, (who’s been getting his own fair share of grief this week over WinPho 6.5):

“I agree that no single company can create all the hardware and software. Openness is central because it’s the foundation of choice.”

One disgruntled European expressed displeasure at all the iPhone talk, asking why it deserved attention when it had only a tiny sub-percentage of the market.

Responded AT&T Mobility chief Ralph de la Vega:

“Because the other 99.5 percent of the industry is trying to copy the iPhone.”

It wasn’t all hugs and kisses from AT&T, though, even with the iPhone providing life support to their bottom line. Jabbed de la Vega:

“The iPhone is a great success, but it would be even better if the applications were interoperable,”

Um, yeah, because then people might actually want to buy those other, less innovative, non-iPhone you have stockpiled in your warehouse?

Confession: it was a pretty boring call from Palm CEO Ed Colligan today. No Pre release date. No Pre feature update. No assault on Apple. Nothing and pretty much more nothing. We kinda wish Steve Jobs had crashed the event and gone all Christian Bale on Palm. At least that would have been interesting! Still, PreCentral caught this tidbit, for what it’s worth:

On the issue of PATENTS, Colligan made sure to note that there are no pending legal actions with Apple right now. More pointedly, he noted that Palm has 15 years worth of patents (over 1500 of them in total) and that in patent fights often go like this:

The reason you do that is to have a defensive position. It’s like two little porcupines going around, and you don’t want to touch each other because you might get stung. You peacefully coexist and everything’s OK and you keep working together. We’re very respectful about people’s intellectual property, we believe we’re huge innovators and have been for a lot of years and that this product has an enormous number of innovations in it. If something does happen there, we do have the portfolio, we think to defend ourselves and to be successful doing that. But nothing’s happened to date, so we’re really just focused on getting the product out the door.

Note to Palm: while you fancy yourself a prickly little rodent, Apple’s totems are the big cats, so either you’ll bloody their mouth and run them off, or they’ll use those quills to pick their teeth clean after they’re done eating you.

Microsoft CEO and current CES Keynoter Steve Ballmer, prior to the original iPhone 2G’s launch, had quite a bit to say:

“You can get a Motorola Q for $99. [...] [Apple] will have the most expensive phone, by far, in the marketplace.” [...] “There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance.”

Flash forward 2 years, where Apple’s $199 iPhone was the best selling smartphone — and all around phone — in the late-summer quarter, and the cost of unlocked Windows Mobile handsets like the Xperia X1a rocketed past the $800 price point, and what does everyone’s favorite internet dance sensation have to say? According to the Financial Times (Registration annoyingly required, text via Ars Technica):

Ballmer conceded that Apple’s iPhone (and RIM’s BlackBerry) have “clear market momentum.” Indeed, Windows Mobile has suffered in the face of strong competition from RIM and Apple.

This. Is. iPhone JEOPARDY!… Judges Round!

Way back on March 14 we covered some of the bold, bodacious pontifications the CEOh-no’s of Microsoft, RIM, and Palm had made about the iPhone. Quick-on-the-buzzer as always, it’s time once again to go back to our judges and see how they did!

“Why We’re Not Worried about the iPhone” for 100

Ed Colligan:

“We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone. PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.”

Daily Double-Talk

Steve Ballmer:

“There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance.”

Final Jeopardy!

“Mike Lazaridis”:

“Talk — all I’m [hearing] is talk about [the iPhone's chances in Enterprise]. I think it’s important that we put this thing in perspective.” [...] “Apple’s design-centric approach [will] ultimately limit its appeal by sacrificing needed enterprise functionality. I think over-focus on one blinds you to the value of the other.” [...] “Apple’s approach produced devices that inevitably sacrificed advanced features for aesthetics.”

And to top it all off:

THERE’S a reason that R.I.M. is averse to the iPhone’s glass pad. “I couldn’t type on it and I still can’t type on it, and a lot of my friends can’t type on it,” says Mike Lazaridis, R.I.M.’s co-chief executive and technological visionary. “It’s hard to type on a piece of glass.”

Judges?

10 Million iPhones sold in 2008, almost 7 million in Q4 alone. More units of a single SKU moved than all RIM SKUs combined, and more than (we think!) WinMob licenses as well. 200,000,000 App Store downloads, 5500 Apps available, and now being copied by Microsoft, Google, and RIM. Form factor and touch-centricity copied by both Microsoft-OEMs and RIM (who’s also introducing a no-keyboard Blackberry Storm!). And Palm? Er… Anyone heard from Palm lately?

And the Winner Is!

None of the players today.

For the Pundit Round, be sure to check out Daring Fireball’s awesome set of links, and MacDailyNew’s Compendium of iPhone Naysayers.

Microsoft’s Xbox King, Lord of Zune, and Master of All Things Windows Mobile (i.e. basically in charge of everything but the revenue generating OS and Office franchises… ouch!) decided to comment on the huge iPhone numbers Apple released last Tuesday. Marc Flores over at BGR reports (via BusinessWeek):

“Apple had a big launch of a new product, and they launched at scale in a lot of new countries with a lot of new [wireless] operators. This quarter, RIMM is having its big launch, and at some point we’ll have our big launch. We’ll have to see where things normalize”

Now, we don’t necessarily disagree that there was pent-up demand for a 3G iPhone in existing markets, and introduction of many new markets, along with the honeymoon period many new gadgets from a player of Apple’s caliber enjoys, but…

How about we get some good news round Microsoft Entertainment and Mobile Way, rather than Xbox write-offs, Zune lack-tion, and continued Windows Mobile 7 push backs, before we spend our expensive executive time stepping to Apple, b’okay?

Pop quiz. You run one of the few CDMA-based mobile providers in the world, and while you were rumored to have passed on the original iPhone, thus locking you out of the North American market for Apple’s revolutionary handset, even your Old World parent, Vodafone, has finally, desperately signed up to carry the iPhone 3G in many other markets. Bottom-line, you missed the boat to the point of now being landlocked, and what do you have to say for yourself? You’ll do better? You’ll try harder? You’ll stop with the iClones and actually try to out-innovate the iPhone?

Not if you’re Ivan “the Terrible” Seidenberg, who’s big answer to the iPhone 3G is:

“Steve Jobs eventually will get old . . . I like our chances.”

Yup. Steve Jobs, who helped bring the Apple II (command line), Mac (graphical interface), and iPhone (multi-touch) to the masses, in spite of health concerns that might make lesser CEOs (subjected company not only included but vehemently singled out) lose continence in themselves, will — gasp — grow old.

If that’s best Seidenberg can come up with, his board has a far bigger reason to panic than competition from Apple.

Of course, this isn’t the first time Seidenberg has opened his mouth about Apple only to firmly insert feet.

And luckily (for our funny bones), it’s not likely to be the last!

Michael Dell has gone done and opened his mouth about Apple again:

“Yeah, I could take [Steve Jobs in a fight].”

He’s gone done and done it before, of course:

“What would I do [with Apple]? I’d shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders.”

And we all know how well that’s worked out. Any reason to think this time will be different? Let’s check out the tale of the tape:

Ego: Both are crushing. However, Jobs’ company is called Apple, not Jobs. Edge: Dell.

Build: Jobs is Vegan thin. Dell is big as Texas beef. Edge: Dell.

Reach: Dell once made profits based on Walmart-style supply-chain “management” and low labour costs. Jobs continues to make profits based on unparalleled technological design and innovation. Edge: Jobs.

Record: APPL: $187.01, DELL: $21.69. Edge: Jobs.

Judges?

Dude, you’re getting Vulcan nerve pinched by Mac.

(tip’o the hat to Dieter for the inspiration)

Read

Ah, comedy, thy name is Lazaridis!

What, you may ask, makes the CEO of Blackberry manufacturer RIM so knee slapping-ly funny? Deadpan Setups (on April 27th) like this:

THERE’S a reason that R.I.M. is averse to the iPhone’s glass pad. “I couldn’t type on it and I still can’t type on it, and a lot of my friends can’t type on it,” says Mike Lazaridis, R.I.M.’s co-chief executive and technological visionary. “It’s hard to type on a piece of glass.”

Followed by absolutely killer punch-lines (on May 13th):

The BlackBerry Thunder, as it is codenamed now, (all you “reporting” on it as the Storm are incorrect) will launch in Q3 of this year. It is a full touchscreen BlackBerry — no slide out keyboard

Please. Ouch. My ribs. I can’t take it…

Ahem… Okay. So, if RIM is now iCloning a touchscreen of their very own, is it really that Lazaridis and his friends can’t type on a touchscreen, or that they just can’t type?

(Would go a long way towards explaining those tic-tactiles, wouldn’t it?)

We interrupt this episode of RIM, Lose or Draw? for a quick iPhone JEOPARDY update!

Last time, Blackberry “pusher”, and outage-plugger extraordinaire Mike Lazaridis took “Post SDK Over-Reactions” for a thousand:

“Talk — all I’m [hearing] is talk about [the iPhone's chances in Enterprise]. I think it’s important that we put this thing in perspective.” [...] “Apple’s design-centric approach [will] ultimately limit its appeal by sacrificing needed enterprise functionality. I think over-focus on one blinds you to the value of the other.” [...] “Apple’s approach produced devices that inevitably sacrificed advanced features for aesthetics.”

While it’s still too early to go to the judges, a new competitor has stepped up to the podium, CNet’s Matt Asay (via Daring Fireball).

What is the most expensive phone, by far, on the market?

I walked into my local AT&T Wireless store on Saturday fully expecting and prepared to get a Blackberry 8820. My Blackberry 8800 died while I was in London last week [...] Unfortunately for Research in Motion, maker of the Blackberry, the in-store price for the 8820 was the same as the iPhone. I deliberated for all of three seconds and walked out with the iPhone.

What about “lack of functionality”? Lack of the tic-tactile keyboard, man?

I thought I wouldn’t be able to type on the iPhone without tactile feedback. I was wrong. I’m actually faster on the iPhone than I ever was on the Blackberry, and that’s with only an hour of “training.”

Still, regrets you must have a few, like SMS blasts, animations on email deletion, and the lack of Flash?

But all its good points make up for these negatives. The iPhone is an amazing device. It was inevitable that I’d find my way to it, just as it’s inevitable that it will continue to take more and more market share, eventually breeding lower-end devices that will change the way we use mobile “phones.” The iPhone is designed too well to be anything less than inevitable.

Good answer! But is RIM too far ahead? Can the iPhone catch up? Or is it too close to call? What do you think?

Will Flash come to the iPhone? Won’t it? Will it? Won’t it?

GearLive said yes. Adobe said maybe. El Jobso said too slow, too lite — where’s my middle?!. El Narayenso (er… Adobe’s CEO) said SD-OK! And… now Adobe clarifies that ambiguous yes with another maybe. Kinda:

“[T]o bring the full capabilities of Flash to the iPhone web-browsing experience we do need to work with Apple beyond and above what is available through the SDK and the current license around it. We think Flash availability on the iPhone benefits Apple and Adobe’s millions of joint customers, so we want to work with Apple to bring these capabilities to the device.”

Hooked on the iPhone’s first reality soap yet? Us neither, but we’ll keep on it until those wacky techs finally hook up for good or call it quits forever.

GearLive reported Flash for the iPhone was immanent. Adobe retorted that it was all up to Steve Jobs. His Steveness resorted to telling investors that Flash desktop was too big, Flash Lite was too small, and they were missing a product that was juuuusssst right.

Well, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen hopes Apple’s newly released SDK will help Adobe deliver that middle ground, with or without Jobs’ blessing. Speaking to investors, Narayen said (via Apple Insider):

“We believe Flash is synonymous with the Internet experience, and we are committed to bringing Flash to the iPhone. We have evaluated (the software developer tools) and we think we can develop an iPhone Flash player ourselves.”

Hopefully without those peskyprivacy and security problems, b’okay?

Given the restrictions imposed on 3rd party apps, unless Apple gives Adobe “special dispensation” it seems unlikely that even Adobe could get Flash working in an unplugged-in, sandbox environment, but we’ll see.

Eerily similar to Sun’s Java announcement immediately following the iPhone SDK launch, all that remains now (in terms of rival interactive development platforms) is Microsoft’s Silverlight. Balmer, get your dance shoes!

Just when you thought it was safe to switch to WinMob of Misfortune, iPhone JEOPARDY is back with a bonus round!

Joining us via lifeline is Google Android, first among Linux vaporOS’s (sorry Nova, Access, and OpenMoko!) and fresh from CEO Eric Schmidst’s latest iPhone briefing at Apple’s Board of Directors meeting, we give you the suddenly chatty group manager for mobile platforms, Rich Miner:

“There’s a much larger potential market on Android than for the iPhone. There are things I saw people doing with the first version of the Android SDK that it seems like you can’t do with the iPhone at least at the moment.”

Then, as if catching the Shining-like glare in Daddy Jobs’ eyes, he quickly added:

“[If I were a developer] I’d certainly be looking at the iPhone, and if you believe there will be lots of Android phones out there, as we do, I’d be developing for both platforms.”

Now, for those of you just joining us, remember that Google’s core business is advertising (no, not search, that just pulls the ad revenue), not OS development.Few companies can be good at more than one thing, and Apple is traditionally very good at hardware and software (and wisely leaves Google and Yahoo to do the heavy services lifting on iPhone). Google hasn’t managed to monetize everything in it’s vast repertoire yet, much as Microsoft is struggling to grow outside of Windows and Office.

If Google plans on hitting WinMob standard and Symbian on the low-end and leaving Apple to duke it out with WinMob premium and Blackberry on the high, maybe Miner is making the kind of sense that does. However, if Eric Schmidt is the fox in Apple’s development henhouse and (bigger and), Google can ship a working OS sometime this decade, things could get interesting.

This. Is. iPhone JEOPARDY!

Welcome everyone to the smartphone space where competing CEO’s answer in nothing resembling the form of a question. Lucky for us, however, they’re quick on the buzzer and their bold, bodacious pontifications, more often than not, come right back to bite them on their assets.

“Why We’re Not Worried about the iPhone” for 100

Previously on iPhone Jeopardy, smartphone innovator and Folio-smasher, Ed Colligan of Palm/Treo fame jumped on the iPhone launch:

“We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone. PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.”

Strongly put. Let’s go to the judges…

“Initial iPhone buyers were 10 times more likely than other new phone buyers to have previously owned a Treo.”

Ouch! The correct answer seems to have been “Who are the Mac guys who walked in with a far more than a descent phone and dug into my lunch?” Better luck with Nova!

Daily Double-Talk

Next up was famed Microsoft CEO, monopolist, and internet dance phenom, Steve Balmer who went for the steal:

“You can get a Motorola Q for $99. [...] [Apple] will have the most expensive phone, by far, in the marketplace.”

“There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance.”

Really? Survey says!

The struggling American electronics company Motorola is considering breaking itself up through a sale or flotation of its poorly performing mobile phones business.

NPD’s figures make Apple’s Sept. quarter iPhone sales look even more stellar. Apple sold 1.12 million iPhones last quarter, representing 27% of NPD’s U.S. smartphone market and 3% of the overall Q3 cellphone market.

D’oh! The correct answer looks to have been, “Who was hardly the most expensive and grabbed even more mindshare than their impressive first-year market share (not to mention dominating customer satisfaction reports) while companies I mentioned prepared to flee the space?” No bonus points for lack of bold ActiveSync licensing predictions. Come back next time with WinMob 7, b’okay?

Final Jeopardy!

Now we have current smartphone market leader RIM’s business “pusher”, and outage-plugger extraordinaire Mike Lazaridis taking “Post SDK Over-Reactions” for a thousand:

“Talk — all I’m [hearing] is talk about [the iPhone's chances in Enterprise]. I think it’s important that we put this thing in perspective.” [...] “Apple’s design-centric approach [will] ultimately limit its appeal by sacrificing needed enterprise functionality. I think over-focus on one blinds you to the value of the other.” [...] “Apple’s approach produced devices that inevitably sacrificed advanced features for aesthetics.”

Final answer? Okay, pens down and no peeking!

Well, what do you think? Will RIM’s success just keep on multiplying, or did the Blackberry Boss just gamble it all away?

Find out next time on iPhone Jeopardy!