something in the way

AdMob: Android passes iPhone in U.S. traffic

We saw this one coming, but I did not think it would happen so soon. In AdMob’s latest March report, Android has surpassed the iPhone and accounts for a greater share of smartphone requests in the United States. AdMob does not represent the traditional view of market share (based on the number of handsets sold), but their reports still provide some insightful data.

Android now accounts for 46% of AdMob's U.S. traffic.

Android now accounts for 46% of U.S. smartphone share, while iPhone OS slid to 39%. A greater percentage of Android apps are offered for free so more developers have turned to ads in order to monetize their work.

Google recently acquired AdMob, but the deal is far from done. The FTC is still negotiating with Google, but it looks like our government will try to block the proposed acquisition.

Android highlights from the report include:

Two Android devices, the HTC Dream and HTC Magic, collectively represented 96% of Android traffic in September 2009. Seven months later, 11 devices represented 96% of Android traffic in the AdMob network.
In March 2010, Android traffic share on the AdMob network was divided relatively evenly between the three primary versions of the Android OS: Android 1.5 (38%), Android 2.0 / 2.1 (35%) and Android 1.6 (26%).
Motorola was the leading Android manufacturer with 44% share of traffic in March 2010 due to the success of the Droid and CLIQ. HTC was a close second with 43% of requests, followed by Samsung with 9%.
The Android platform has experienced significant growth in monthly traffic over the past year. Android traffic has grown at a compounded monthly growth rate of 32% per month, going from 72 million requests in March 2009 to 2.0 billion in March 2010.
Two Android devices, the HTC Dream and HTC Magic, collectively represented 96% of Android traffic in September 2009. Seven months later, 11 devices represented 96% of Android traffic in the AdMob network.
The Motorola Droid was the leading Android handset in March 2010 and generated 32% of worldwide Android traffic. The Google Nexus One only generated 2% of Android traffic in March 2010.
The top Android devices vary by country. The top three devices in the US were the Motorola Droid, HTC Dream and Motorola CLIQ. In comparison, the top three Android devices in the UK were the HTC Hero, HTC Dream and HTC Magic.

Unofficial Android app count reaches 50,000+

AndroLib has reported that the total number of applications on the Android Market has exceeded 50,000; this number is a wee bit bigger than what Google itself has reported during a Q1 earnings report. Jeff Huber, Google’s senior VP of engineering reported the number to be a respectable 38,000, which stands as Google’s “official” count.

“We’re sticking to 38,000 for now. We’ll announce when we do our next formal count.”
-Google, to Android Central

50,000 seems to be quite a big over-estimate if Google is sticking to their lower figure; however, I could see the numbers getting easily inflated due to the amount of not-quite-apps on the marketplace. Any search for “Beautiful Widgets” or “Better Home” will give you a sea of entries that are just for skins, which just make finding the original app that much harder. This flood is one of the main critiques of the marketplace, and something I believe needs to be fixed ASAP to bring us a more functional environment to find apps.

Android brings new life to old iPhones

Small newspost to round out the night, but it has been announced a member of the infamous “Dev-Team”, Planetbeing, has managed to port Android’s Mobile OS to the Apple iPhone.

The iPhone Dev Team is responsible for a number of tools that circumvent the iPhone’s security, and the fact that they’ve been able to throw Android on the iPhone is kind of a big deal. As far as I know, this is the first time anyone’s been able to throw a completely different manufacturer’s OS onto the device.

Whether this is just a side project (which is still in alpha, by the way) or something that opens up a realm of multi-booting possibilities, it’s great to see Android being worked with in new and creative ways.

Droid Incredible does TV out (VIDEO)

We learned last week that the upcoming Droid Incredible would do TV out and now we have new details on how it works. Customers will have to purchase an optional accessory that plugs into the micro USB port and sends a signal to a composite video connection.

Wirefly has a short video demonstration of how the accessory works. The phone’s full display is output to a TV and automatically converts to a widescreen view when a movie is played.

Since the accessory works via micro USB, this feature could also appear on similar HTC phones built on the same Snapdragon platform. This would include Google’s Nexus One and the HTC Desire.

No pricing information is available for the TV out accessory at this time.

New doubleTwist integrates Android Market

DoubleTwist has always been our favorite program to easily convert all types of media for our Android phones and the service continues to add new features all the time. The latest update for doubleTwist (Mac only for now, PC coming soon) now includes a fully integrated Android Market to allow users to search for apps. Unfortunately, application syncing is not yet supported and users will have to scan QR codes to download apps. Anyone can browse the doubleTwist Android Market online in addition to their new podcast search engine.

From doubleTwist: We’ve integrated the Android Market into doubleTwist to help users search, browse and discover new apps. The launch of the doubleTwist Android Market finally brings Android on an equal footing with the iPhone by enabling users to discover apps and view ratings and comments without being limited by the small screen real estate of their phone. With the Android Market integration doubleTwist ties together apps, music, photos, videos and podcasts for Android users.

Jan 6

Video of Nexus One running Adobe Flash

The video shows some obvious short comings in the flash handling (slight flickering very visible) but it’s still a huge step forward and I can’t wait to start browsing flash sites and playing games from my browser. Are you guys excited at the prospect of finally having flash in action?

Demo of Google Goggles aka Google Visual Search

Google has been keeping a secret for most of this year and it’s called Google Goggles. We mistakenly called the service Google Visual Search earlier today, but the actual name is in fact Google Goggles (no not Mail Goggles). CNBC is running a special called Inside the Mind of Google and I highly suggest you tune in (or DVR) and watch the entire show. A short clip of the Google Goggles segment has been posted on YouTube.