Linked List: July 21, 2010

Wednesday, 21 July 2010

Apple vs. the Rest of the Cell Phone Industry 

According to Goldman Sachs, Apple makes more profit from mobile phone sales than the entire rest of the industry combined.

Update: Actually, it doesn’t appear to be the entire industry — just RIM, Motorola, Nokia, HTC, and Sony Ericsson. So the list doesn’t include Samsung and LG. But still: striking.

The Top Idea in Your Mind 

Fascinating insight from Paul Graham on ideas and the act of thinking. Very true for me.

Apple Revenue by Product Segment 

That pink triangle for the iPad is rather amazing — it’s already bigger than the iPod, and the iPod segment includes the iPod Touch. Update: An alternative view on the same data from Macworld.

Who’d Win in a Fight, Batman or a Shark? 

I think this is the clip from the next Christopher Nolan movie they’re showing at ComicCon.

AT&T Spokesperson in May: 1.44 Percent Dropped Call Rate Nationwide 

Responding to a local TV report polling users to report their own dropped call rate on the major US cell networks, an AT&T spokesperson responded:

Statistically valid drive test shows the AT&T network continues to deliver the nation’s fastest 3G network and near best-in-class call retainability nationwide. AT&T’s network dropped only 1.44 percent of calls nationwide, within two-tenths of 1 percent of the industry leader and a difference of less than two calls out of 1,000.

That’s from May, this year. But it’s not specific to 3G, and not specific to the iPhone. For all we know, the iPhone 3GS is far better or worse than AT&T’s overall average. The other thing that’s interesting is that this 1.44 percent number comes from a “statistically valid drive test” — according to Steve Jobs last week, AT&T logs all dropped calls, so they should be able to state their actual dropped call rate, not just the rate from a “drive test”. One can only presume their actual dropped call rate is at least a bit higher than this 1.44 percent rate.

Update: On the other hand, a couple of readers suggest that drive tests are actually a better gauge, at least if you’re trying to judge the network itself. They isolate the test from problems that might be from the phones. So I think this 1.44 percent number might be a good baseline for judging phones on AT&T’s network.

BBC News: Do Typefaces Really Matter? 

Tom de Castella:

Selecting a font is like getting dressed, Ms Strawson says. Just as one chooses an outfit according to the occasion, one decides on a font according to the kind of message you are seeking to convey.

So the knock against e-books, in my opinion, is that they’re not carefully dressed like print books are. They’re wearing generic uniforms.

AT&T’s 3G Dropped Call Rate: 0.91 Percent (PDF) 

On slide 11 from AT&T’s Q4 2009 financial results presentation, they claim a dropped call rate for 3G calls of 0.91 percent for December 2009, down from 1.18 percent the year prior. We don’t know whether the iPhone 3GS already exceeded this average, though.