Want to make some easy money? Go read this piece by Yahoo’s Jared Spurbeck and then you can sue him for whiplash.
The title?
“How Are the Nook and the Kindle Beating the iPad?”
The first sentence?
Maybe “beating” is too strong a word.
Nice lede, Tom Wolfe.
Also, OW, OW, OW, THE MACALOPE’S NECK.
The iPad continues its dominance, and for most buyers—and app developers—it’s still the only tablet game in town.
But compared to every other tablet out there…
Every tablet other than the one I chose to put in the title. Those tablets. Not the one in the title, though. That one’s still on top.
…even the HP TouchPad and its legendary $99 clearance sale, the Barnes & Noble Nook and the Amazon Kindle Fire are cleaning house.
We’re num-ber two! We’re num-ber two!
And according to Morgan Keegan analyst Tavis McCourt, “maybe 1-2 million” iPad sales were stolen by the Kindle, based on his estimates for last quarter’s sales and Amazon.com’s data.
Of course, how one comes up with such an estimate is more of an art than a science. Actually, considering the track record of these analysts, “voodoo” is probably a better word than “art.”
Now, Amazon won’t say how many Kindle Fires specifically that it’s sold.
But, if you examine these chicken entrails closely, you’ll see that…
And it’s probably unreasonable to think that every one of the people who bought one would’ve bought an iPad instead, and didn’t.
You think?
So what do the three companies have in common?
They’re all retailers
True, but in Apple’s case the store is there to support the device, not the other way around as it is with Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
“Android tablet” makers, in contrast, are building largely identical devices that compete only on price and specs, and tossing their wares into the retail channel as though throwing darts while blindfolded.
More like dead carp than darts, but that’s the smartest thing you’ve said so far.
The results have been predictably bad … which makes the iPad, the Kindle, and the Nook look spectacular by comparison.
Jared. Jared. Jared. Look at that sentence and then look at the title. Jared. Go on. Jared.
Do you see what you did there?
OK. Now go to your room and don’t come out until you’re ready to apologize for what you’ve done.
[Editors’ Note: In addition to being a mythical beast, the Macalope is not an employee of Macworld. As a result, the Macalope is always free to criticize any media organization. Even ours.]