iPhone hosts nearly half the ads served on mobile platforms.
Apple now has overall market share leadership in the worldwide smartphone segment, having overtaken former frontrunner Nokia based on browser calls for mobile ads. A recent report at BNet Technology cites AdMob statistics that show Apple with 49 percent of mobile ad traffic in the first quarter of 2009, compared to 32 percent for Nokia.
The market shift may have less to do with customer preferences for Apple’s hardware, however, as a recent smartphone industry analysis from Gartner notes; services and applications have become the primary drivers of smartphone success.
The stats appear to vindicate Apple’s approach to application distribution via the iTunes App Store. William Volk, CEO of entertainment and business apps vendor PlayScreen, said on a professional forum posting that “other stores simply aren’t matching the ARPUs [average revenue per user] of the Apple App store.”
The iPhone OS also enjoys a comfortable lead over every other mobile operating system, including Symbian, Research in Motion (RIM), Palm and Windows, with May numbers showing iPhones had 68% of the browser requests in the survey.
Apple hired Academy Award-nominated director David Fincher (Seven, Fight Club and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button) to show off the latest iPhone in its TV ad debut.
Titled “break in,” (a nod to how most folks got iPhone video capability before the 3S?) the 30-second spot highlights the video angle and hints at other “amazing new features.”
Trust Apple to deliver scintillating graphic evidence of just how revolutionary and amazing its impact is at events such as the Worldwide Developers Conference taking place this week at San Francisco’s Moscone Center West.
The company is drawing raves for the massive ‘hyperwall’ it has erected in the conference hall, made from twenty 30″ Cinema Displays showcasing the icons of 20,000 of the most popular applications on the iTunes App Store. The icons pulse and send a light wave rippling outward every time an app is downloaded from the store, creating a stunning visual depiction of just how in-demand are the services of developers attending the show.
Apple has said 3.000 apps are downloaded every minute and is giving conference attendees quite an eyeful of what that can look like this week.
Jon Lech Johansen, the world-famous reverse engineer who earned the nickname DVDJon for cracking the CSS DVD-copy protection scheme years ago, again made headlines awhile back for his software program DoubleTwist, which removes old school iTunes Store DRM. That was a bigger deal in the years before every song on iTunes went DRM-free, but many users (myself included) have never paid the 30 cents a song needed to upgrade their older libraries — so DoubleTwist still has a purpose, if you for some reason want non-Apple hardware.
Anyway, all of that is a long pre-amble to highlight the above hilarious picture, which is DVDJon’s physical display ad for DoubleTwist, which was posted on the south-facing wall of the flagship San Francisco Apple Store. As it turns out, the ad wall is actually owned by the Bay Area Rapid Transit system and the ad doesn’t misuse any Apple trademarks, so it’s perfectly legal — even if it appears to show Apple endorsing a product that helps people to stop using iPods and iPhones.
The ad was taken down over the weekend, but DVDJon says it will return soon. Genius.
My friend Jeffy picked up this pack of stickers at a Macworld past. Do Mac users have a sense of humor ? Should they be printed up as stickers for MacBooks?
UPDATED: YouGov sent a little more info about the survey’s other metrics — posted after the jump. Basically, Apple still leads on quality and reputation, but MS has caught on value, satisfaction and willingness to recommend.
Microsoft’s “Laptop Hunters” ad campaign is hurting Apple, according to a new consmer survey by YouGov BrandIndex.
“With the Laptop Hunters campaign, Microsoft is making an impact on the perceived value score in the mind of consumers, particularly young consumers,” Ted Marzilli, global managing director of BrandIndex, said on Tuesday afternoon when I phoned him up.
YouGov is an international market research firm based out of London. Its BrandIndex survey queried about 5,000 people online from a pool of about 1.5 million, Marzilli said. It claims to be representative of the U.S. adult population.
Its latest survey shows a clear uptick in Microsoft’s “value,” and a clear downtick in Apple’s. The change coincides with Microsoft’s high-profile campaign.
This isn’t the first Apple ad out after Microsoft’s “Laptop Hunter” campaign, but this one responds directly to the ads where pseudo-everyday consumers shop around and pick PCs over Macs.
Here Megan stands between hip the Mac guy and a line of brown-suited PCs — like a dating game show? – while she talks about her (computer) needs.
The PCs who don’t fit the bill file out but some are still lining up to win her affection until she says, “I just want something that works, without a lot of viruses or a ton of headaches.”
Leaving her alone with Mac Man. Cute couple.
Is the promise of long-term stability with little drama enough to combat the price claim made by the Microsoft ads?
MICROSOFT SPOKESMAN: Hi — you look dumb. Would you like me to advance the dumbest possible argument for Zune ownership? See, it’s like this: iPods, though they’re really cool, cost money to get music on them! So you should pay a $15 monthly subscription for Zune music, which is basically free! You can trust me — I’m a financial planner. People in finance have never misled anyone!
APPLE BLOGGER: I had a music collection long before the iPod existed, dumbass. And who on earth owns an iPod classic these days?
Apple is getting down with the ‘Green is the New Black’ concept in a limited, though nonetheless laudable way.
The company is offering to re-cycle, free of charge, any school’s old, unwanted Mac computers, PCs, and other qualifying electronic waste, as long as schools register by July 31, 2009.
The program will only run for one month, until August 31, 2009, and schools must recycle a minimum of 25 pieces in order to participate.
Special consideration is being given to data security, according to Apple, which promises:
* All recycled hard drives will be ground into confetti-size pieces.
* Customers will receive a certificate of destruction for each lot recycled through the program.
* All asset tags and other identifying information are removed prior to destruction.
* All of the electronic waste collected through the program is processed domestically in the United States.
AdWhirl, a platform for iPhone applications that allows developers to switch between ad networks on-the-fly, has released a report indicating that applications that crack the top 100 in the Free Apps list can make between $400-$5000 a day in advertising revenue.
Sam Yam, co-founder of the company formerly known as Adrollo, says AdWhirl has signed over 10% of the top 50 applications in the App Store to the platform and is serving 250 million ad impressions per month. AdWhirl’s platform gives developers access to multiple iPhone ad networks at once, allowing them to compensate when one network doesn’t have enough ad inventory, something Yam says happens as much as 40% of the time.
Having launched only in the last month, AdWhirl reports going rates of $1.90 eCPM (effective cost per thousand impressions) and 2.6% CTR (click-through rate), numbers that should make both advertisers and free app developers optimistic about the viability of the ad supported free app business model.
Microsoft’s controversial Laptop Hunter ads were probably conceived, pitched and perhaps created on Macs, if these office snaps of the ad agency behind them are anything to go by. They show the desk of Alex Bogusky (with two Macs) at Crispin Porter + Bogusky plus the surrounding office space, also full of Macs.
I wouldn’t mind getting paid to sell PCs, as long as I didn’t have to work on them, too.
Despite touting its green credentials in new TV ads, Apple is ranked fairly low in Greenpeace’s latest survey of green electronics.
Greenpeace’s quarterly green scorecard was released on Wednesday, and while Apple got high marks for reducing toxic chemicals, it got low marks for not supporting global recycling initiatives or using more recycled plastics.
Overall, Apple scored [...]
Counterfeit iPhones have come a long way. They’re now almost identical to original iPhones, fooling bargain hunters on sites like eBay.
Look at the video below from Dana Stibolt, founder of MacMedics, who was given a fake iPhone bought on the auction site.
At first glance, it’s almost identical to current models, from the touchscreen to the [...]
In a move that’s a bit like thumbing his brush at the lawyers who sent a nastygram when we mistakenly reported David Hockney’s gallery artworks were created on his iPhone, the artist is offering free downloads of three wallpapers made on his device.
The unsigned trio of flower paintings from the 72-year-old pop artist maestro — [...]
Remember when Lonnie told you about an easy, fool-proof way to turn on iPhone tethering in the US? Well, there’s a way, way easier method, and it’s much, much more foolproof.
Simply point Mobile Safari to http://help.benm.at, select your country, download the profile for your carrier, and install. The settings menu will add an Internet Tethering [...]
