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Comment by QE2 | Hacker News Reader

>His four main points are: openness...

Actually, openness is not one of his points. He mentions it in passing only.

>Android definitely has momentum but at their current rate it will still take years to match the iPhone's share of the market.

From February to May of this year, Android went from 9% to 13% of the market. In that same time, the iPhone went from 25.4% to 24.4%. At that rate, it will take about six months for Android to match the iPhone. Google is seeing almost 5 million activations a month, and growing exponentially.

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This is why statistics are always dangerous in the hands of, well, anyone :)

Don't forget that Feb-May is the maximum time from a new iPhone release. This quarter saw an actual release so I wouldn't be surprised to see them snatch back the 1%. More importantly you can't extrapolate from just the one quarters figures :) Android sales could trail off or people could end up sending them back in high numbers after a few months etc.

Also, Android is offered on a wider array of phones; so it is reasonable that as it gains popularity it will enroach into the smartphone market. It will be interesting to see this quarters figures; I suspect Android will grow but so will Apple.

As pointed out, the more important metric is profitability; and currently Apple have that in bucket loads.

(not that Android is doing badly, but it is a bit further behind, say 18 months, than people tend to suggest)

There are also a lot of high-end Android phones that have come out in the last two months, and coming out soon. In the end, this discussion doesn't really matter. Obviously, nobody knows the future.

I also realize that these numbers only represent one quarter, but if you look at the previous quarters, you'll see that Android is experiencing steady growth. I have no doubt that the iPhone 4 will be a boon to Apple's numbers. We only have to wait another three months to find out! :)

The big difference of course is that apple actually makes money and not only on the phone, but their app store.

Marketshare matters little in this context, what matters is how good a business it is for you.

And in that respect android is a shitty business as it,s not even close to opening up the revenue stream of advertising which is the real reason google is even in the phone business.

I checked our server stats this morning & at least over here in Germany, Apple iOS device growth is still outpacing Android growth. My guess is that while the absolute number of Android devices is growing, the number of people actually using those devices for browsing the web is simply not growing as fast. This won't change until Android offers a browsing experience that bests the ease-of-use of iOS devices.

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