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They were poised to it in 2011. Where are they? What i think is that Android tablets market share will stagnate with Windows 8 tablets in the market...
 
I think it'd be hard to accurately predict anything at this point. It could go all sorts of ways.

Android floods the market with devices

Windows 8 will be all "I'm a real OS, on a tablet!"

and the iPad is insanely popular but hated by anti-Apple people who spread their ideas to others



And tablets are not complete computers. They aren't on-par with the capabilities of normal computers, at least.
 
Who cares? The platform and its apps are utter junk. I should know, I have had several of their devices.
 
Bolstered by the Kindle, Javelin predicts that Android will eventually overtake the iPad, though it doesn’t say when."

The question is, should Kindles... which are Android tablets with their own curated Android app store... be counted in Android tablet numbers.

It's like the reverse of iOS devices... which normally have a curated app store... but if jailbroken, can download from elsewhere.

Of course, Google doesn't count them in their activation numbers because they don't license Google apps, but then Google also doesn't count all the other tablets being sold around the world without official Google apps, yet they are undeniably Android.

Hmm. I think the difference is, people don't buy Fires to get an Android tablet. Therefore they shouldn't be counted if the purpose is to determine user preferences. They can be counted as an Android developer target, of course.

From a report of browser connects at public WiFi hotspots I believe Android will overtake iPad when donkeys fly.

Browser stats are meaningless when it comes to sales. (They're wildly incorrect at showing how many iPads vs iPhones have been sold, for example.)

My wife and daughter rarely surf the web and thus would not show up in website browsing stats. They do, however, use Android tablets constantly for dedicated apps.
 
What's all this Windows 8 talk about? Windows 7 is already available for tablets. And just like 7, 8 tablets will cost a fortune.

Unless you mean Windows RT (fka Windows for ARM). Then people are just going to be pissed that only Metro apps will work on it.

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On a similar note, Nokia was the worlds biggest handset manufacturer last year. Quantity hardly matters when your product is cheap junk and people choose it because it was the free phone at the time.
 
The "report" is really ridiculous. I'm NOT an Apple "fan" but I do have an iPad. I also have a Galaxy Nexus phone (can't stand the iPhone). The issue is how anyone can compare 1 device (an iPad) vs. 100's of devices (Android tablets) running anywhere from $80 to $800 and not say the one with 100's of choices will have more out there. That proves nothing. It's like saying all vegetables outsell stringbeans.
 
I've been an android user since the first device was released, and still have an HTC Thunderbolt that I love to this day. I waited and waited and waited for an Android tablet to come out that got me interested enough to drop the coin for. My wife is an apple user from her desktop/laptop/phone so it was only natural that I get her an iPad for her birthday. Well, after about a week of this thing being in the house and having a chance to play with it, i bought myself an iPad 2 wifi model that i tether to my Thunderbolt's 4g connection. I've played with some of the Android tablets, and some are good but seemed buggy and sluggish. I will always keep an android phone just because I enjoy the ability to really tinker with it, change custom ROM's, alter the colors, icons, background images, fonts etc to make it a truly personal device. This tinkering doesn't come w/o it's fair share of annoyance like force closes, random reboots and other strange behaviors. When it comes to my tablet though, i just want it to power on and work as designed, and the iPad does this beautifully. Just my .02.
 
Competition is good for all of us. Maybe apple will be a little less stubborn and give us some customization and other silly things that have been around since 1995 like mark/select all in mail, not closing the app store when you download an app, giving us a skip forward button for ipod, allowing us to customize colors of chat bubbles (gasp!), and heaven forbid font face and color.

I have no idea how you think competition works:

1) If someone comes out with a better tablet than the iPad, you might say "well, now Apple will have to improve their product to compete" but people would just buy the better tablet (that's in fact what defines 'better tablet' - the one that satisfies consumer wants) and leave Apple behind.

2) You might think that Apple would come out with an even better tablet, then, to get those consumers back. But this is what's already happened. The iPad is exactly what happens when Apple competes with other tech manufacturers. They've competed and currently have won.

3) Nobody is going on Android forums saying "thank goodness Apple made a better tablet, this competition is going to make manufacturer X improve their product". You know why? Because it's not happening. Apple is the biggest competition to every other tablet maker and what's the result of this competition? Landfill electronics. Yeah yeah, someone is going to cite a niche app or the amazing multitasking, but all I can say is 'scoreboard'. Apple's been providing competition to other manufacturers and all they do in response is flail around. I've been reading for two years now how Android is going to be serious competition in six months' time or whatever. In the meantime, in reality, they aren't.
 
I'm curious how many of the naysayers actually have android tablets to compare with? I've got both. My wife has always wanted a small 7" tablet so we started with a Nook but recently got a Samsung Galaxy tab 7+. I'm very impressed with it.

I recently bought an iPad 3 for myself. The ONLY reason I bought it was for the screen since I do a lot of reading. I'm getting tired of Apples products being so locked down (and yes, I've jailbroken before on my phone and iPad2). As soon as an android (or maybe Win8 - depends on app availability) tablet becomes available with as good a screen, I'll probably jump ship. In order to keep me, Apples really going to have to step things up with iOS6.
 
Browser stats are meaningless when it comes to sales. (They're wildly incorrect at showing how many iPads vs iPhones have been sold, for example.)

My wife and daughter rarely surf the web and thus would not show up in website browsing stats. They do, however, use Android tablets constantly for dedicated apps.

Not talking about sales here, or what has been built, shipped, or sitting in someones closet, its about market share, products in use.

WiFi stats are just another indicator and the bulk of apps fall between connectivity social media, and games.

Connectivity is a valid sampling technique. Similar to counting the different types of tablets in use, visually, in coffee shops, conferences, college classrooms, airports, trains, etc.

If you open your eyes even a lay person who doesn't practice market speak can see it isn't even close to 1 out of every three like the article stated.

As far as Android share climbing, the bulk of the people who have iPads would not trade them for todays Android tablet device.

If Apple were to lay down, stop developing tablet technology, and get out of the business the tablet market would begin to wither on the vine.
But that isn't going to happen now is it?
 
I recently bought an iPad 3 for myself. The ONLY reason I bought it was for the screen since I do a lot of reading. I'm getting tired of Apples products being so locked down (and yes, I've jailbroken before on my phone and iPad2). As soon as an android (or maybe Win8 - depends on app availability) tablet becomes available with as good a screen, I'll probably jump ship. In order to keep me, Apples really going to have to step things up with iOS6.

You've hedged your bets pretty good here. You're all set up to keep buying Apple products while still complaining about them instead of actually putting your money where your mouth is.
 
You've hedged your bets pretty good here. You're all set up to keep buying Apple products while still complaining about them instead of actually putting your money where your mouth is.

Umm...I've put my money where my mouth is. I've bought other tablets and used them. I've bought Apple products and used them. I'm not some blind fanboy that worships Apple or any other manufacturer. I don't buy products to be cool or hip. I buy them to fill a need.

I consider the pro's and con's of a device. With my iPad 3, I've decided that the quality of the screen is more important to me that the limitations I dislike about iOS. If, in the future, another tablet appears that fills my needs better, I'll switch to it.
 
Umm...I've put my money where my mouth is. I've bought other tablets and used them. I've bought Apple products and used them. I'm not some blind fanboy that worships Apple or any other manufacturer. I don't buy products to be cool or hip. I buy them to fill a need.

Tell us exactly what Apple has to do with iOS 6 for you to not jump ship. Otherwise you can just fake the high road and say "well, I was going to bail on Apple but they really stepped things up [whatever that means], heh, glad they strove to keep me as a customer"

Tell us that you'll actually get an Android with a better screen when one is released, not "I'll probably get one, Apple is sooo locked down and I'm soo tired of it, wah wah, but I still buy their products".

As you say, you either buy the best thing for your needs or you don't; the rest is just mealy-mouthed equivocating and waffling.
 
Tell us exactly what Apple has to do with iOS 6 for you to not jump ship. Otherwise you can just fake the high road and say "well, I was going to bail on Apple but they really stepped things up [whatever that means], heh, glad they strove to keep me as a customer"

Tell us that you'll actually get an Android with a better screen when one is released, not "I'll probably get one, Apple is sooo locked down and I'm soo tired of it, wah wah, but I still buy their products".

As you say, you either buy the best thing for your needs or you don't; the rest is just mealy-mouthed equivocating and waffling.

The type of person that comes to a forum like this will often look at an Android tablet as something that as "more open" (probably without even understanding what open means) and more customizable, rootable, whatever. The average tablet user, which is probably 99% of the world, doesn't give a crap about any of that. They give a crap about the experience. No Android tablet is going to match the experience of an iPad as far as smoothness and the way the apps are designed. As Tim Cook clearly demonstrated at the iPad launch, many tablet apps on Android are just scaled up phone apps and don't really take advantage of the form factor very well.

So I don't care how many apps the Android market has or how many gazillions of models these rinky dink manufacturers flood the market with, you still aren't going to get the experience that you get on an iPad. If you say that you are, you simply have not tried an iPad.
 
Tell us exactly what Apple has to do with iOS 6 for you to not jump ship. Otherwise you can just fake the high road and say "well, I was going to bail on Apple but they really stepped things up [whatever that means], heh, glad they strove to keep me as a customer"

Tell us that you'll actually get an Android with a better screen when one is released, not "I'll probably get one, Apple is sooo locked down and I'm soo tired of it, wah wah, but I still buy their products".

As you say, you either buy the best thing for your needs or you don't; the rest is just mealy-mouthed equivocating and waffling.

I'm not going to hijack this thread with a list of all the things I don't like about iOS but a few things off the top of my head would be the desire to have a file system, better multitasking, and more customization with widgets etc. Even the most rabid Apple fanboy has to admit that its a far more restrictive system than android.

The strides I've seen android make with their last few releases have been more significant than what I've seen from Apple lately. My first Apple product (iPhone 3gs) ran iOS 4 (I think). Since then, the big changes I've seen from Apple were folders for apps, "multitasking", and notification center. Sure, there have been other improvements but they are minor to me. When compared with the changes for Honeycomb and ICS etc., Android has been rapidly closing the "experience" gap. In my opinion, Apple still leads with the hardware, specifically the display. That's why I bought an iPad 3. If another tablet comes out with what I feel is the same or better hardware and an equivalent "experience" with out the restrictions of iOS, I'll switch.
 
The survey is flawed and lacks any valid, useful data.

What we can reliably predict is that eventually, Android-based tablets will have more marketshare than the iPad however, Apple will still reel in over 50% of the profits in the tablet market. This may not happen until 2015 or 2020, but it will happen.
 
I'm not going to hijack this thread with a list of all the things I don't like about iOS but a few things off the top of my head would be the desire to have a file system, better multitasking, and more customization with widgets etc. Even the most rabid Apple fanboy has to admit that its a far more restrictive system than android.

The strides I've seen android make with their last few releases have been more significant than what I've seen from Apple lately. My first Apple product (iPhone 3gs) ran iOS 4 (I think). Since then, the big changes I've seen from Apple were folders for apps, "multitasking", and notification center. Sure, there have been other improvements but they are minor to me. When compared with the changes for Honeycomb and ICS etc., Android has been rapidly closing the "experience" gap. In my opinion, Apple still leads with the hardware, specifically the display. That's why I bought an iPad 3. If another tablet comes out with what I feel is the same or better hardware and an equivalent "experience" with out the restrictions of iOS, I'll switch.

I agree with this 100% as an owner of both an ICS tablet and the iPad 3.
 
I love it when folks call the kindle fire an android tablet. Its not one, it runs a completely different version of android and is really just a content deliverer.

You just contradicted yourself and in doing so fully illustrates the primary problem Android OS has in the tablet marketplace.

Android is and forever will be whatever the device manufacturer wants it to be. That's both its strength and failing. I can take Android OS, strip it of almost all of the usability features, throw my own convoluted UX on top of it and sell it as whatever I want. You can do the same.

The Kindle Fire most assuredly _IS_ an Android Tablet. So is the Prime. But one is meant to be an iPad competitor, the other is meant to be an upgrade to a Kindle. Use cases aside, they are both Android tablets.

This confuses the customer greatly and I believe will be the downfall of Android. People keep saying Google took the Microsoft approach and just wanted their OS running on as many different hardware platforms as possible. That's not true....Microsoft, for good and bad, kept firm control over the UX the entire time. Google abdicated entirely. And in doing so, created a brand that's no longer a brand but a mere utility.

People don't buy a utility. They buy an experience.
 
If another tablet comes out with what I feel is the same or better hardware and an equivalent "experience" with out the restrictions of iOS, I'll switch.

What you feel is better hardware? This is exactly what I meant by hedging your bets - the threat "if Apple doesn't step up their game I'll maybe probably buy an Android" is completely empty. No matter what Android or Apple release, you can just say "well I don't feel it's better hardware and the experience isn't as good as iOS and I'm still buying Apple products because they're the best thing out there but listen to me still complain about the closed system and hand-wave about what Apple had better do if they don't want to lose a customer."

I just want you to make a commitment and say "If you can get an Android which offers the specific things X, Y, and Z, I'll buy it" so we can see if you're true to your word or just looking for an excuse to complain about things which don't actually affect your purchasing behavior in the end. All you've done is made a wishy-washy statement about vague criteria which don't commit you to anything at all.

EDIT: There's already forums full of people who think there's Android tablets with better hardware and fewer 'restrictions' so I'm sure once one pops up with a retina-equivalent display AceCoolie will be there with cash in hand. If not, it's because of the mobile goalposts of 'better experience' where he's begrudgingly forced to buy an iPad despite his grievances.
 
Connectivity is a valid sampling technique. Similar to counting the different types of tablets in use, visually, in coffee shops, conferences, college classrooms, airports, trains, etc.

I totally disagree that web stats are meaningful when it comes to sales or current ownership. History is proof:

Back when there were only about 15 million iPads sold, web stats showed twice as many iPad hits as iPhone hits. Using the web figures, one would assume there were less than 8 million iPhones sold... instead of the 100 million that actually had been. (all figures from memory, but you get the point)

The problem is, the iPad is apparently overwhelmingly popular for browsing the web. It skews the results dramatically.

If you open your eyes even a lay person who doesn't practice market speak can see it isn't even close to 1 out of every three like the article stated.

The number seems believable from what we know:

Let's assume they're correct about 16 million tablet users in the US. ISuppli estimated ~4 million Fires sold almost solely in the USA before January and that's no doubt risen. Add in the Samsung Tabs, Asus and Nooks, and Android's share could easily be 30-40%.

As far as Android share climbing, the bulk of the people who have iPads would not trade them for todays Android tablet device.

I agree. However, just as with smartphones, the tablet market is expanding all the time. You don't have to rob Apple for Android to gain more percentage.

If Apple were to lay down, stop developing tablet technology, and get out of the business the tablet market would begin to wither on the vine.
But that isn't going to happen now is it?

I think the Genie is out of the bottle, and it doesn't matter if Apple stopped selling tablets, any more than people would stop buying smartphones if Apple dropped the iPhone.
 
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