Charles on… anything that comes along

At The Register, I’ve written an analysis of how things look following the release of the iPod nano. And the answer is: not too good for the other companies, though they’re going to be trying their damndest to promote it if Apple’s share of the hard drive music player market shrinks - as it might, because iPod minis (the previous best seller) had drives, but the iPod nano (ready to inherit its crown) is flash-based.

Well, that’ll be fun for the press releases, but if Samsung’s MP3 division can say that it wants to be No.1 in the market in 2007, but then its flash memory division goes and cuts a deal to sell Apple 40 per cent of its output, then..

What we’re seeing is a company achieving dominance of an emerging market. Apple announced this month that it has 80 per cent of the music download market in the UK. It’s got the majority of the MP3 player market. When even your rivals realise they’ll do better selling you parts than competing with your players, you can say you’re in charge.

And the nano is a damn fine piece of machinery. Pity the screen scratches so easily. My advice: leave the plastic cover on.

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• Two data points on the iPod's continuing popularity in the UK (19 October 2004; score: 123.51%)
• How do you stop Nicole Kidman being famous? If Sony et al can answer that, they can beat the iPod (21 September 2005; score: 95.58%)
• Steve Wildstrom gets it wrong - unusually - on the iPod vs WMA (9 November 2004; score: 91.12%)

Browsing the online pages of UK Press Gazette (which I don’t much; no web feeds that I can find) I came across this amazing episode where a broadcaster said ministers lie all the time.

But it wasn’t that bloke Humphrys. (He only said some don’t tell all the truth.)
No:

Take these quotes from a broadcast news political editor, in a session at the Edinburgh Festival: “Tony Blair lied to me… John Reid lied over the NHS… They [politicians] all lie absolutely consistently.”

So was the author of these remarks, Sky’s Adam Boulton, treated to hysterical calls for high-level inquiries and covered with heaps of ordure? Er, no. His remarks weren’t reported anywhere, even though they were made in front of an audience of journalists.

And nobody saw fit to ‘leak’ the transcript to The Times, either, as a certain Tim Allan did with the Humphrys speech. Allan then used the Times story as a hook for a piece highly critical of confrontational political broadcast journalism.

Which makes it all the more strange that the Boulton remarks didn’t get any play. For to whom was he speaking on the Edinburgh stage? Step forward, Tim Allan - Sky’s former PR, who remains on some kind of contract with the broadcaster.

The whole thing stank. What’s worst is that the BBC couldn’t win in the Humphrys thing: if they ignored it, The Times would spin it on and on, but if they give him a tap on the wrist, it’s held up as some great telling-off. Hmm, The Times..

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• Paging Beverley Head, white courtesy phone please.. (10 August 2005; score: 70.3%)
• Gillian McKeith, white courtesy phone please (30 September 2004; score: 51.41%)
• Apple sues Think Secret over headless iMac and iWork: yeah, but try finding them (5 January 2005; score: 50.82%)