"Oxford" <apony@pasture.com> wrote in message
news:apony-72E5D3.13203125062009@news.qwest.net...
> The iPhone continues to take over the smartphone market, it has now
> taken 69% of all smartphone traffic, which ironically is getting close
> to iPod share...
According to AdMob, a company that inserts ads into websites and apps, yes.
> In February it covered 51% of the pie. By April it had grown to 59%. And
> by Thursday morning, when AdMob released the May edition of its U.S.
> smartphone pie, Applešs (AAPL) share had grown to 69% < a 10 point
> increase in one month.
>
> More here:
>
> <http://apple20.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2009/06/25/iphone-share-of-u-s-smartphone-traffic-hits-69/>
Interestingly, if you read the actual reports instead of bloggers'
third-hand coverage of them
<http://metrics.admob.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/admob-mobile-metrics-april-09.pdf>,
you'll notice, buried in the methodology, AdMob tells us some interesting
things (this is from April's, so the numbers are slightly lower than May's):
"* The iPhone OS had 8% market share of handset sales in 2008, but generated
43%
share of mobile Web requests in April 2009. Ad requests from applications
contributed
to this heavy usage."
"* Android also generated a higher percentage of mobile Web requests than
its share
of handsets sold. While Android had less than 1% of smartphones sold in
2008, it
generated 3% of mobile Web usage. Ad requests from applications contributed
to this
heavy usage."
And...
"Note: AdMob serves ads into both iPhone and Android applications which are
responsible for a SIGNIFICANT PORTION [emphasis mine] of their overall ad
requests."
So, by amazing coincidence, the only platforms that had more mobile web
"traffic" (traffic=requests for AdMob advertising) than their market share
were the two platforms that developers can embed AdMob ads into
applications. My wife plays a bunch of free games on her iPhone that
constantly serve up ads. Nice to know that's "mobile web usage."
But, that's the "mobile web+app" category. You're mostly bragging about the
percentage of HTML browsing, Oxy. That one is comes from a different
source, "Net Applications" and is disclaimered thusly:
"Net Applications collects mobile browsing data only
from mobile devices that render HTML pages and Javascript. Visits to WAP
pages
are not included."
And, interestingly, tied for second place was a category called "other",
which Net Applications tells us "Other includes Java ME." Presumably
(although this is just a guess- Net Apps plays their methodology close to
the vest) Java ME-based browsers, that don't "fink" the phone make/model/OS
would get lumped in here. This would really bump Blackberries- most 'berry
users I know use Java browsers like Opera Mini instead of the default
Blackberry browser.
So, what we've discovered, is that phones with full HTML browsers (like
iPhones and Android) that default to "full" HTML sites use more HTML than
phones that default to mobile/WAP sites. Imagine that!
So, in effect, what they've really "discovered" was that iPhone OS users
received the majority of AdMob's mobile advertising, and view far more HTML
pages.
Interesting stuff though, if you poke around. An interesting stat was that
24% of mobile ad requests in April were over WiFi, and "the Top 5 WiFi
devices were the iPhone, iPod touch, Sony PSP, HTC Dream, and HTC Dash..."
So, even those "heavy traffic generating" iPhone OS users seem to do a
significant amount of browsing over WiFi rather than put up with AT&T's 3G
network!
Surprising to me, was despite their ubiquity, the total HTML usage stats for
all mobile devices combined, including the iPhone/iPod Touch, is still under
1% of web browsing. I would've guessed that between the increase in uptake
of smart devices, and mobile phones acting as many folks only "computer" in
emerging markets that we'd see the total break 1% by now.
> Congrats everyone!
Enjoy. What'll you discover next? TV viewers watch more TV advertising
than book readers?