

Apple’s sinking share in France and Germany may be fueling patent wars - zacharye
http://www.bgr.com/2011/12/22/apples-sinking-share-in-france-and-germany-may-be-fueling-patent-wars/

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roc
One of Apple's defining characteristics as a business has been its unfailing
disinterest in market share in and of itself. So why on Earth would anyone
assume that an expansion of a legal mess started in the larger markets, into
the smaller ones, is driven by a sudden intense concern about market share?
Particularly when the larger markets are where Apple sales and growth is
strongest? If their legal goal was to protect market share, their strategy is
exactly backwards.

Now is it more likely that: A. Apple has suddenly not only change its tune on
market share, but is pursuing this new obsession _ineptly_? Or, B. that Apple
is simply doing what every single large company does in patent concerns:
starting in the largest markets and then expanding into the smaller ones?

Further, looking at market share without regard to overall market growth is
somewhere between innumerate and intellectually dishonest. And the regularity
of this oversight in tech reporting makes it difficult to believe it's an
honest mistake.

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r00fus
There are no honest, repeated, mistakes. Flawed reasoning, confusing
correlation with causality, and outright mis-truths seem to be the hallmark of
"business journalism".

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Steko
Pretty par for the course with BGR.

Inputs:

(1) press release or wire repackaging of press release that is about Apple.

Outputs:

(1) complete rewrite with no blockquotes.

(2) but uses every piece of data in the original.

(3) vaguely reference the source 3/4 of the way down.

(4) 10 other links all to BGR articles.

(5) increase wordcount 45%

(6) increase linkbait with terrible speculation.

How long til the inevitable AOL buyout?

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jonhendry
I've assumed their choices of venues was tactical and based on regional legal
quirks, not related to market share.

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drats
As evidenced by the patent claims already fought and lost, they might prevail
on a little but not I don't think it will be much in the end. It's not really
some tiny android using brands they need to sink but rather Samsung, HTC and
other giants. Even if they prevail in 1 or 2 of the 10 or so claims they are
making these guys will be able to eat up the costs (and one or two might be
able to force a cross-licencing with their own patents). So in the end,
nothing is going to stop the current trajectories where Apple will be
relegated to fighting with second place in the market with Microsoft.

To my mind this is as it should be. Smartphones can only be a screen 3 to 6
inches in a thin form with a slightly modified desktop metaphor (icons on a
background), and are based on a wide infrastructure that is not Apple owned.
Free code initially (BSD, Linux and Webkit). SSD research, gorilla glass,
AMOLED, camera chip manufacturers and ARM CPUs. Apple is more or less just
another PC company, and smartphones are now pretty much just small PCs. Apple
has a good music and app market which they can leverage to make sure they have
a larger slice of the phone market than on the PC market, but it's not
manifest destiny that they should own it. They also have to consider the
public relations costs compared to prevailing in a few corner patent cases and
looking (rightly so) like sore losers who don't want any competition.

Apple should stop whinging and fire 80% of the legal department and use the
money to acquire another company like the one that produced Siri. Then again,
perhaps the PR department is behind this to create another "stabbed in the
back" mythology, like their dubious claims to stratospheric innovation on the
desktop.

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justincormack
There doesn't seem to be any evidence for this hypothesis, or for his one that
slow growth is lowering market share. But something makes a difference, and
English speaking countries seem to be more Apple oriented, could be a factor.
France and Germany are stronger open source markets than say the uk, could
also influence arly adopters. Would be interesting if there is more data about
phone choice.

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rjd
Are you sure its not driven by Steve jobs and I quote "I'm Going to Destroy
Android, Because It's a Stolen Product".... "I'm willing to go thermonuclear
war on this."?

Seems like analysts are trying to find an economic reason for something that
may well be an emotion driven thing.

