From my Who Cares? department comes a Friday slideshow of nonsensical facts from Ziff-Davis’ Baseline. Worthless? Yes. Interesting? Yes. For example:

Woz crashed a private plane upon take-off in 1981, and soon thereafter ended his active role in the company.

And who remembers this?

The Apple Lisa was the first to commercialize a GUI in 1983, but it tanked in the marketplace.

38 more just like that. Fortunately, it’s a Flash slideshow so you won’t have to click to get bored. It’ll happen automatically.

An Australian company uses the name DOPi (iPod spelled backwards) on notebook bags and cases for Apple’s popular products. Apple sued the down under company and lost:

In the tribunal hearing, IP Australia, the government body that oversees trademark applications, said Apple overlooked the fact that there were already a large number of products that have the “i” prefix, for example iSkin and iSoft to name just two, all of which are operating in the same class of electronic goods as Apple.

Good for PODi. If anything, maybe Apple will stop the iEverything nonsense and come up with something more original for the rest of the 21st century.

It’s another sign of the times in the early 21st century when Apple’s stock market value eclipses that of retail giant Walmart. Philip Elmer-DeWitt in Fortune:

Ninety minutes after Apple (AAPL) opened its online store for iPad pre-orders Friday morning, a burst of trading — roughly 2 million shares in 30 minutes — pushed its stock price to $227.73 and its market cap to $206.5 billion.

Values go up and down, but Apple is the third most valuable company in the US, slightly higher than Walmart and Berkshire Hathaway. As a comparison, note that Apple’s annual revenue is approximately $50-billion, while Walmart exceeds $400-billion.

This is where the blogosphere becomes the wild west. Andrew Erlichson on Phanfare:

We just bought two iPads, about 30 minutes apart. Our order IDs are 10,000 apart. Assuming those order IDs are sequential, and they appear to be, then Apple is selling 20,000 iPads per hour. Assuming most orders are for the $499 model, and that people are only buying 1 per order, that means Apple is selling $10MM/hour.

Immediately, the headline Apple is currently selling 20,000 iPads per hour sweeps across the internet. Not only is the math bogus, so is the logic. Erlichson also points out the obvious:

Of course that is not sustainable, but if they did it for a year, it would be $87.6-billion.

Apple sells other products, too, which could skew the order IDs. If all that glitters is not gold, then all that we read is not fact.

Mike Cane asks:

Why has Microsoft found itself in third place, behind Apple and now Google, in the mobile segment of computing?

Third place? Microsoft is falling, fallling, fast. Cane pulls quotes from Wall Street Journal reporter David Bank’s book, How Bill Gates Fumbled The Future of Microsoft. In essence, Bill Gates nixed a proposal from a top engineer in 1999 to scrap Windows’ heritage in mobile devices and start over. Gates:

It’s very disappointing you feel that way. We don’t have time to start from scratch.

I would argue that Gates decisions have not fatally wounded Microsoft. Today, Microsoft is just another technology company with a long heritage, a lot of money, and not much else.

Ron McElfresh in Mac360 on the future of the Mac in an iPad, iPhone, App Store world:

For what will be an increasing number, and eventually a majority of users, the basics of personal computing can be covered by an iPad. Email. Browsing. Writing. Reading. Games. Beyond that, iPhone apps will adapt to the larger screen of the iPad and bring more typical Mac functionality to the iPad—photo manipulation, audio and video editing, even video calling.

Sascha Segan writes in PC Magazine, Apple’s iPad Could Kill The Mac.

After falling behind Apple’s Safari, Google’s Chrome, and Opera in the browser Javascript rendering wars, Mozilla is working on a new version of Firefox with a new Javascript engine. Ryan Paul in Ars:

The secret sauce that will drive Mozilla’s new JavaScript engine engine into the fast lane is some code borrowed from Apple’s WebKit project. Mozilla intends to bring together the powerful optimization techniques of TraceMonkey and the extremely efficient native code generator of Apple’s JSCore engine. The mashup will likely deliver a significant boost in Firefox’s JavaScript execution speed, making Mozilla’s browser a formidable contender in the ongoing JavaScript speed race.

If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.

From Business Insider, Jay Yarow sums up all the little behind the scenes pieces of Apple’s lawsuit against HTC:

• Until now, smartphone makers were trying to match Apple’s user experience, and not thinking about patents. Now all the companies are checking patents before proceeding.
• Apple’s legal actions have “temporarily left competitors playing catch-up with their shoelaces tied.”
• Post-lawsuit, handset makers are wondering if Android is the best way to topple Apple.
• That’s leading to a renewed interest in partnering with Microsoft, and its new Windows Phone Series 7.

What goes around, comes around.

Apple’s patent fight against handset maker HTC has all the makings of a Gunfight At The OK Corral. Except Apple is there with guns, and poor old HTC has a pocket knife. John Paczkowski in AllThingsDigital:

A Deutsche Bank analysis of yearly patent filings by Apple (AAPL), HTC and Google (GOOG) reveals that Apple is by far the leader and HTC the laggard. Over the past few years, Apple has amassed some 3,000 patents, HTC just 58.

Ouch.

What happens when you give typing lessons to a geek wannabe? Critical thinking disappears. Christian Zibreg in Geek on Sony to stop Apple dead in its tracks with iPhone and iPad killers:

Sony won’t put up with Apple’s aggressive expansion into its own turf anymore.

Uh oh. Here it comes again. Another Apple iPhone, iPod, iPad killer. Do you mind if I dismiss Sony’s efforts to get back in the game?

Anyone dismissing Sony’s renewed attempts to slow down Apple needs a reality check. Yes, one could say that Sony lost its touch with consumers by allowing Apple to take over the music space. You could also blame them for losing ground in just about every consumer electronics category except gaming.

One could argue that Apple’s iPod touch success, in heavy use by casual gamers, is as much a game success as Sony’s recent gaming efforts. Alright. I’ll bite. Apple’s products have been kicking Sony’s products—hardware, software, online—since the iPod debuted in 2001. So, why should Apple quake in fear of Sony’s newest renewed efforts?

Sony has been around since the end of World War II, long before Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak created the first personal computer in Jobs’ parents’ garage.

And that’s an argument how? How many of Sony’s executives from before Apple’s birth are still at Sony? My guess? Zero. Surely there’s more to this effort to pump up Sony’s repeatedly anemic efforts to reclaim past glory.

Sony commands vast categories, unlike the self-proclaimed consumer electronics giant Apple which only plays in phones, computers, and music.

So does Microsoft, yet their efforts to venture into portable media players, game consoles, and smart phones have met with terrible financial losses. I see more of a Sony comparison to Microsoft than to Godzilla awakening to reclaim his island from Apple.

Sony is one of the world’s largest media conglomerates and a top player in electronics, games, and entertainment. While Jobs boasted the fact that the $15.68 billion revenue in the last quarter made Apple a $50 billion company, Sony’s fiscal year 2008 revenue exceeded $78.88 billion. Although down from $90.5 billion a year earlier, it’s still way more than Apple raked in.

So, we’re to believe that Sony will rebound because revenue fell by $12-billion last year, but Sony still has more revenue than Apple? Gimme a break, Christian. Have you ever heard of profits?

While Apple’s influence in entertainment stems from the iTunes and iPod ecosystem and the fact that Jobs is the largest individual shareholder in Disney, Sony owns several movie studios and record labels. And just like Apple, Sony designs its own hardware, software, and services that work together.

Sigh. This is too easy. Chris, how well do Sony’s own hardware, software, and services actually work together. Oh. That’s right. They don’t. Maybe that has something to do with Apple’s success. Unlike Sony, Apple made things work together.

See, if anyone can take on Apple, it’s Sony.

How’s that working out so far?

Christian is writing for Geek.com. Ostensibly run by, and read by, well, you know—geeks. Where’s the math? Exactly how is Sony going topple Apple’s position? How will Sony’s new products and services line up and compare against Apple’s current line? I’m a non-geek and I want to know. Where are the iPhone and iPad killers? How will they be better than Apple’s products?

Here’s a painful truth. Market leaders are terribly difficult to unseat. Saying so doesn’t make it happen. Strutting and posturing does not bring customers in the door. Quality products and services that work well together actually matter to customers.

Here’s another painful truth. Knocking off a market leader has requirements. If Company B wishes to sell more gadgets than Company A (taking away their customers), Company B must have a much better product, or a much less expensive product, or a much easier-to-use product. Any two will help the effort. In the end, it’s math. Sony can’t do the math. Neither can Geek.com.

Geek.com + Sony - Apple = Fail.

I don’t understand why this news event wasn’t covered on Fox News. What Sarah Palin hath wrought:

Speaking unto an audience of anti-immigration advocates, global-warming deniers, and members of the Tea Party Nation, former Alaska governor and vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin gave forth utterances Monday that reportedly opened the sixth seal of the Book of the Apocalypse.

And:

“Small town folks—the folks who grow our food, run our small businesses, and teach our kids—are getting pretty riled up by President Obama’s big socialist ideas,” Palin spoke as the stage upon which she stood was rent apart by an unseen hand, opening as unto a great chasm, whose gaping void she narrowly escaped by clinging to the podium.

And finally:

Chaos and disorder then spread across hill and valley to every corner of the earth, eyewitnesses reported, and as the minions of the Antichrist prepared for their millennium of world dominion, even the teeming masses of heathens could not in their hearts deny that the final phase of Armageddon was close at hand, and that you’re darn right Joe Six-Pack pays too many taxes already.

Gene Steinberg’s TechNightOwl on Flash:

In 1998, Apple killed the floppy drive. It took a few years for the rest of the industry to catch up, but the handwriting was clearly on the wall.

It took 10 years to eliminate the floppy disk drive.

Segue to 2007. Apple introduces the iPhone without support for Flash. People complain, but iPhones sell at ever-increasing rates. Today, with some 40 million of them around the world, and the iPad on the immediate horizon, Steve Jobs has made it quite clear that Flash is the floppy drive of the 21st century. It’s time for it to go.

When? How? Soon is rather ambiguous.

Flash will be history, and Adobe is just going to have to adapt to the situation and let those other products keep them in business. It’s not as if Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign are going away any time soon, even without Flash support.