Telstra has revealed the addition of almost one million new mobile services in the six months to December 2011, but Sensis revenues plummeted 24 percent in 12 months.
A BusinessWeek story asserts that number comes from two sources, but Apple refused to comment (as usual).
Given that Apple's announced goal was to sell 10 million units by the end of 2008, it sounds like the company plans to hit the ground running.
The trouble is, some commentators will find fault whatever Apple does. If it can't meet the initial demand, it'll be castigated for failing to accurately predict demand and poor inventory management.
If it gets plenty of stock into the stores, some will say it is an attempt to shift as many as possible before people realise it isn't all it's cracked up to be. This is rather like the movie studios' strategy of not offering advance screenings - especially to reviewers - when they have a suspicion that a film is a turkey.
Indeed, there are elements of this in the BusinessWeek story: "with its touch-screen keyboard, powerful battery-sapping processors, and a panoply of new applications, the iPhone is far more complex than the iPod. Glitches could lead to costly recalls and returns if buyers find the phone buggy or confusing."
And the IT industry's eternal curmudgeon John Dvorak has quoted "yet another industry insider" as saying "The keyboard is a disaster, and people are going to return the phone in droves. I'm guessing 20% will go back."
We're also seeing the usual crop of reports about company X, Y or Z (should that be L, N or S?) announcing or preparing so-called 'iPhone killers'. What most of them fail to realise is that the 'iPod killer' has yet to materialise not because of styling or feature lists, but because Apple got the user interface right.
The few people that have had a chance to use an iPhone seem to think Apple's got that part right, and according to Apple CEO Steve Jobs the iPhone interface is well protected by patents. That doesn't mean other companies won't be able to do an even better job, but they won't be able to simply clone the iPhone any more than they've been able to clone the iPod.
It's still possible that Apple will stumble, whether that's because the company really did misjudge what a significant portion of the market wants and needs, or because of an execution issue such as build quality, inadequate or mistimed supply, or even software issues.
Since AT&T has apparently logged over one million enquiries about the iPhone, it looks like that running start is on the cards.
David Bass
| For the fourth year in a row, IDC has placed content security provider Websense (NASDAQ: WBSN) at the top of the IDC Worldwide Web Security 2011 –…
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