Don't believe much of what you read about tablet sales (or anything else)

Preliminary note, in a weak attempt to be fair, if you read my posts you know I am one of the original Apple guys and despite attacks by the true-believer Apple community, I remain extremely into Apple products.

If you were watching the news feeds for technology, during the past few months you would have seen dozens of supposed news articles extolling the virtues of the release of "new" tablet computer and claiming that the product would be an "Apple iPad killer." You need to understand that these so-called news articles are really not even thinly disguised propaganda, just like statements made about the economy, housing sales, immigration and many other topics. None of the tablet computers were more touted as the end of the iPad than the flagship tablet from Samsung. Most recently, Amazon's Kindle was taking the world by storm (or so the articles would lead you to believe). So what happened in the real world outside of the propaganda?

Third Quarter sales' figures are out and the headlines read, iPad leads as Q3 tablet shipments jump 264 percent. Here is a quote from the c/net article,

During the three-month period ended September 30, 18.1 million tablets were shipped worldwide, representing a 23.9 percent gain over the second quarter, and a whopping 264.5 percent increase over the third quarter of 2010. However, IDC had expected 19.2 million tablets would hit store shelves last quarter, indicating the market was a little more sluggish than it had anticipated.

Regardless, several companies did well during the third quarter, and Apple was chief among them. The iPad maker shipped 11.1 million tablet units, according to IDC, helping it nab 61.5 percent of the market. Samsung's tablet line secured 5.6 percent market share to grab the second spot.

Surprisingly, HP's TouchPad was the third-most-popular tablet during the period, shipping 903,000 units and securing 5 percent market share.

Now, ask yourself, why did so many more people buy an iPad rather than the cheaper, Android-based alternatives? The article does point out that Apple's market share dropped slightly. The same thing started happening with the computer sales, the market got so large that huge sales became less and less of a share of the entire market. But think about this, Apple's sales were such in the third quarter it is like the entire city of Los Angeles except for a few suburbs, almost every man, woman and child, went out and bought an iPad.

Interestingly, if you go on to read the rest of the c/net article, the writer is still predicting the demise of Apple. Quarter four will tell. That will be the first time Kindle sales will be recorded. Estimates are that over 63 million tablet computers will be sold in 2011. I suggest that they will start giving them away as premiums when you get your oil changed.

You might want to exclusively read my tech side on FamilySearch's TechTips