Eric Chemi at Bloomberg Businessweek puts things into perspective for the iPhone haters:

If [the iPhone] were its own company in the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index, IPhone Inc. would outsell 474 of those companies–ranking between Wells Fargo (WFC) ($90.5 billion) and Marathon Petroleum (MPC) ($84.9 billion). The iPhone’s $88.4 billion in annualized revenue tops 21 of the 30 component companies in the Dow Jones industrial average–it would be the ninth-biggest stock in the Dow 30
That’s a big Twinkie.

Great interview with Horace Dediu for Forbes.com:

Q: Is Tim Cook the right CEO for the company at this time?

A: I hold the belief that he’s been CEO for much longer than it seems. Jobs was not a CEO in any traditional sense. He was head of product and culture and all-around micromanager. He left the operational side of the company to Cook who actually built it into a colossus. Think along the lines of the pairing of Howard Hughes and Frank William Gay. What people look for in Cook is the qualities that Jobs had but those qualities and duties are now dispersed among a large team. The question isn’t whether Cook can be the “Chief Magical Officer” but rather whether the functional team that’s around Cook can do the things Jobs used to do.
Sharp insights.

Microsoft launched a new site, Microsoft by the Numbers which highlights all their product stats like:
over 170,000 apps for Windows Phone
over 2 billion minutes per day spent by Skype users
76 million XBox 360 consoles sold to date
It looks like they’re missing a big number though.
Where’s the $900 million write down for all the unsold Surface RT tablets?
I couldn’t resist. Microsoft, you set me up for this.

The Verge: CBS blackout sparks rise in TV show piracy

CBS’s block on Time Warner Cable (TWC) customers is less than a week old and already the blackout is fuelling a rise in TV show piracy. TorrentFreak reports that the percentage of illegal downloads rose substantially in the week since it went dark, as piracy rates for popular CBS show Under The Dome increased by 34 percent over the course of one weekend. As downloads went up, the show unsurprisingly saw its lowest viewing figures this season.
My wife worked at NBC Universal for over 10 years. One of the many things I learned about television from her was don’t fuck with peoples’ cable.

Omnicom and Publicis are joining to form Omega Supreme.
Damn.

Chart taken from Tech.pinions via Daring Fireball

Designers (like me) love to talk about how successful Apple is in context of Design—software, operating system, hardware—but Apple’s popularity and profitability are due to much more than the big “D”.
This email exchange between Steve Jobs and News Corp./HarperCollins sheds light on how important negotiating (or for Jobs, not negotiating) has been to Apple (Tim Cook’s supply chain mastery is a whole other story).
Let’s face it, without content (music/movies/books) and simple content delivery mechanisms on iPads, iPhones and iPods, they’d just be beautiful hardware devices with nothing to do.
Reading Jobs’ emails reminds me of poker. When you watch a true master playing, you understand it’s more than just the cards they’re holding that determines if they win. It’s intelligence, Jedi mind tricks, attitude and confidence all combined into one.

Haydn Shaughnessy at Forbes is worried about Samsung’s success (via BGR):

Samsung Electronics continues its astonishing launch program by introducing the Galaxy Note 8.0 into the US, tomorrow, April 11th, having quietly launched in the UK last week. But is the Korean company stretching itself too far, too fast?
This is why you have to take tech press with a grain of salt. Actually, with a salt lick.
Shaughnessy sees Samsung’s success as a bad thing. And if they were doing poorly and not exceeding estimates, that would be bad too.
And Eva Mendes is too hot.
You can’t win with these guys. Anything for a headline.

The Verge: Apple Store creator failing to remake his retail magic at JCPenney
Retail “magic” only works when you have killer projects people crave.
JCPenney doesn’t have any.
And Ron Johnson isn’t a magician.

My post from earlier today reminded me of a phrase a coworker introduced me to a few year ago:
Seagull Status
You might have a company that’s your client with multiple point people you meet with on a regular basis, but then there’s the stakeholder. The seagull.
Why is this person the seagull?
Because he or she can fly into a room, shit on everyone and fly out. Scott free.
That’s a seagull.
I know you know some seagulls.

The Verge: BlackBerry Creative Director Alicia Keys tweets from iPhone, pins blame on hackers
Haha. What bullshit.
I wonder how much money is really enough for celebrities like Keys. It’s not enough to be a multi-millionaire-dollar-making musician. You have to get more money being a puppet “creative director” for a mobile phone company that’s circling the drain.
While on this topic, Justin Timberlake was just named creative director of Bud Light Platinum. Really? Bud Light? You’re seriously proud of being creative director of Bud-friggin-Light? If you’re not going for a delicious microbrew, at least go for Samuel Adams or something European like Stella Artois or Heineken.
And isn’t “Bud Light Platnium” an oxymoron?
It’s like saying “Premium Cow Manure”.
Update: In related news, Bryan just informed me Beyonce was just named Head Receptionist at Pepsico, and I got an anonymous tip Cheech Marin was named Head of Quality Assurance for Marijuana at Corona.

From Apple’s press page:

By early last year, Apple’s cash balance had built to a point beyond what we needed to run our business and maintain flexibility to take advantage of strategic opportunities, so we announced a plan to return $45 billion to shareholders over three years. As of next week we will have executed $10 billion of that plan.
Hear that, Michael Dell?
They did it.
Well, half of it anyway.
Update: Mister Dell, don’t count on the other half of your advice coming true. The whole part about “shutting down” and such.

Apple has posted the details of their record-breaking Q1 2013, but as John Gruber has noted, the financial and tech press can’t help but be disappointed in it.
This reminds me how much of the financial world is nothing more than one, big horse track with lots and lots of windows to place bets at. Investors put money down on companies they think will do well based on hearsay, rumors, speculations, ideas they pull out of their asses and unverified articles in Chinese newspapers.
The problem is, everyone not working at Apple, Inc—which includes those investors I just mentioned—know little to nothing of what Apple is doing, going to do, or thinking about doing, so they’re wrong a lot because, well, they’re fucking guessing on shit.
There’s good and bad eggs in every industry, and like a good company invested in the long-term growth of their employees, there exist investors with long-term plans with their investments that aren’t distracted by short-sighted noise. This noise we’re inundated with in the tech and financial news is produced by fickle and destructive people.
Analogies always help make things relatable, so here’s a shot:
Imagine your salary, bonus and job security wasn’t in direct correlation to your performance or agreed-to goals with your management, but by outsider researchers scrutinizing your every move on the job (I’m picturing the ‘Bobs’ from Office Space). Not only are these researchers scrutinizing you, but they’re betting your salary and bonus on whether you hit certain goals in the future. I forgot to mention they wouldn’t tell you these goals or how they came up with them. I should also mention these people are easily convinced by rumors spread by your co-workers. And by tweets by random people. And cloud formations.
Once the researchers are armed with their “research”—which might or might not contain facts—they talk to your upper management to share their findings. Based on what they hear, upper management then adjusts your salary and bonus accordingly and tells you once it’s done.
Yeah, that’s unfair. Just like a lot of the financial analysis in the news.
As Dan Pallotta says over at Harvard Business Review points out, Apple could unveil a time machine and the market would still be disappointed.