The reason so many care about these numbers is they want to use them to say their OS is better than the other when it isn't relevant at all. And, the masses make a lot of dumb decisions: just watch the elections coming up!
That doesn't make my remark any less true. Walk in to a cellular store and there is one or two iPhone models on the display. The entire rest of the store is Android phones made by dozens of different companies with new models coming out every day. Of course Android should have the bigger numbers, look at what the iPhone is competing against! Not to mention, a lot of Android builders will cut corners on build quality and offer the same mostly software features as the iPhone on much cheaper hardware. Which phone is your mom gonna pick? The expensive iPhone or the plastic Android sitting next to it that claims to do the same thing—but free with a 2 year contract.
If I'm being defensive, it's because I'm annoyed. I come to hacker news to learn new things and peek in to the world of development, something I'm fascinated in as a designer. I just so fucking sick of the flamebait threads.