Even though people were made to wait much longer than usual for this year’s iPhone, and it was not quite as revolutionary as expected, it has quickly become the fastest selling iPhone ever.

With just a few weeks left of the year here is a roundup of recent lawsuits, sales info, and more importantly, Siri developments, from Apple.

Apple no longer the only iPad name owner 

A Chinese court has ruled that Apple does not own the iPad trademark in China. Apple had tried to sue Proview Technology, a Taiwanese company that originally trademarked the iPad name in 2000.

Apple claims to have bought the name from Proview, but the court ruled otherwise, leaving Proview open to counter-sue Apple.

Proview are reported to be seeking a 10 billion yuan (£1 billion) settlement. This is a serious blow to Apple’s ambitions in China, which it considers to be its largest up-and-coming market. Rumour has it that Apple plans to launch iPhone 4S contracts in China in the next few weeks, but their new legal woes could certainly delay the launch.

Apple sales still solid 

Amazon’s new Kindle Fire is starting to eat in to Apple’s global tablet market, with the new Kindle expected to give Amazon second place in the tablet market by the end of this year, right behind the iPad, but the iPad is still selling very well. Any lost sales are almost certainly more than made up for by the massive worldwide growth in iPhone sales, heralded by the iPhone 4S.

Global iPhone sales this quarter are expected to top 30 million units. Based on the October sales, the iPhone has become the best-selling smartphone in the UK, finally ousting Android from its position as the top operating system for British smartphones. Samsung remains the worldwide top smartphone manufacturer, but its sales are definitely being eroded by Apple, particularly as the latter company starts to open up new markets such as Brazil, China, and Russia.

Launch of My Xbox LIVE for iOS

Apple fans who also own Xboxes can now get Xbox LIVE updates on their phones, with the launch of My Xbox LIVE for iPhone and iPad. Xbox LIVE was previously only available for Windows Phones, and the My Xbox LIVE app looks very much like the Windows Phone version, allowing access to news and video trailers for the latest Xbox games, as well as all the usual Xbox LIVE social networking and messaging aspects.

Siri: from strength to strength

Owners of the iPhone 4S generally love Siri, despite the app’s limitations (notably its poor location-based functionality outside the USA, and as has been recently discovered, its apparent pro-life political stance, whereby it “cannot understand” requests for abortion clinics and abortion info).

The convenience and sheer social cachet of a voice-activated virtual assistant seems to be a major driver behind the 4S’s massive worldwide sales.

Apple is committed to making Siri even better, as can be seen from six recent job listings there. They are looking to employ three full-time translators to take Siri into new languages, two full-time Siri software engineers, and a full-time Siri apps engineer (who will improve the way Siri interacts with all the other iPhone 4S apps).

This suggests that Apple is very keen to maintain their development edge over their rivals. No one else has anything even close to being as functional or accurate as Siri, when it comes to voice-activated apps, and it’s likely to take years before they even get close, particularly if Apple is constantly raising the bar.

Could smartphones finally have their killer app? It does look like Apple has finally conquered the high end of the market – at least, for the moment.

Facebook launching ‘Places’ for dominating the ‘location’ game is just another example of that. ‘Foursquare’, a promising startup which was once offered over $120Mn by Facebook (which Foursquare refused) is now facing an invincible challenge by ‘Facebook Places’, Facebook’s very own location sharing feature. Foursquare is literally playing for survival now.

And Facebook’s ‘web domination’ message is so loud and clear that even once-established social network like Orkut chose to shake hands with Facebook, instead of competing with it. And now, the very first social network in Internet history, Myspace, is doing the same, deciding to get out of Facebook’s way and choosing to shake hands(connect) with them.

Today, Nov 18, 2010 at 12 noon, Mike Jones, Myspace CEO and Dan Rose, VP for Partnership and Platform Marketing, Facebook will be making some joint announcement and hence the invitation to media guys for joining a webcast for the same.

Now that Myspace has completely re-designed itself and no more calling itself a ‘Social Network’ but an ‘entertainment hub’, the chances are that Myspace would be announcing its adoption of ‘Facebook Connect’ to get more Facebook users to its website. Or worse, it could be announcing the same ‘profile linking‘ stuff that Orkut and Facebook got into.

As all competitors in Social networking turf have more or less given up the battle, we now have just one reigning Social Network in existence and that’s Facebook. But i guess, competition is good for constant Innovation and people love to have better options, right !

Hey Google, don’t disappoint and bring out your social beast fast !

But it’s not there yet. Facebook says the newly launched service will be rolled out to all of its 500 million users within coming few weeks or so. In other words, the whole universe of Facebook will not get the new service immediately. It will be a gradual rollout. So right now, you can’t just go and try things yourself.

Rather, you can read about the Messaging system Facebook has built for its users. So here we go…

Facebook Messages:  An Overview

In the generation of Web 2.0, sophisticated emailing tools, smartphones and Social networking, Facebook thinks about ‘communication’ a whole lot differently. According to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Communication among people needs to be simpler and more unified than what it is now.

Currently, our communication, according to Zuckerberg, is fragmented. We communicate through various devices via different methods, namely IM, SMS, email or Facebook messages(he didn’t care to mention ‘Tweets’ by the way).

In general, we use

• Email accounts to send/receive emails,
• IM clients/emails/phones to have ‘real time chat’
• Mobile phones for sending/receiving SMS
• Facebook for sending/receiving Facebook messages and so on…

Now, Facebook wants all of the above to happen right within your Facebook account. No matter which person you want to contact(Facebook friend/non-facebook friend/professional contact), what exactly you want to send/share(text/document/image/audio/video), which mode of communication you want to use(email/IM/SMS/FB message), all should happen and be controlled by yourself, right within your Facebook account. And that’s what Facebook Messages is all about.

With Facebook messages, Facebook is looking to simplify(over-simplify?) the conventions of communication we are used to. No subject line, no cc, no bcc, just the ‘text’. Further, seamless integration with Office web apps will make sending/sharing/viewing Microsoft Office documents(doc,xls/ppt) an enjoyable experience for Facebook users.

Very soon, Facebook will also start providing @Facebook.com email addresses to Facebook users to be able to receive emails/IMs/SMS, dubbed as Conversations from people residing outside Facebook.

Overall, Facebook Messages aims to be a One-stop-shop for all kinds of communication we do within our social/professional circle.

Facebook Messages: Main Components

Facebook Messages comprises of three major things:

1. Seamless Messaging
2. Conversation History
3. Social Inbox

Seamless Messaging: Already explained above, seamless messaging simply means that Facebook Messages will provide a unified way of communicating with anyone(facebook/non-facebook users), without bothering to use some specific hardware(phone for SMS) or software(email account for emails) while writing your message.

Conversation History: With Conversation history, all your conversations with any specific individual will remain united & documented, no matter which mode of communication is used and when. Whether it is SMS, chat, email or FB message, everything will be documented right within Facebook.

Social Inbox: With Social Inbox, your Facebook friends will have a priority in your Facebook Messaging system over other contacts/conversations. All your conversations with your Facebook friends(any mode) will land in your Social Inbox(higher priority) while other communication(official emails/sms) will land in different folder. Having higher priority, Social Inbox will remain your default messaging experience.

Why Facebook Messages Isn’t a Gmail Killer

First of all, it was awkward for me to hear Facebook messages, being dubbed as a Gmail Killer. If it were to kill email system completely, so Yahoo mail, Hotmail, Gmail, Aol mail and every other smaller email services would be affected, not just Gmail, right.

Also, Zuckerberg himself clarified this point to media that Facebook Messages is no Gmail/email killer. However he admitted that utility of current email systems could come under question if Facebook messages succeeds in a big way.

In my opinion, Gmail or any popular email client will not be ‘killed’, even if all of 500 million FB users embrace Facebook as their primary communication tool, which, in itself, is extremely improbable. But again, Facebook Messages may succeed in stealing the limelight from current email services and eventually boost overall utility of Facebook  as a Must-have web utility (just like Must-have online tools that only Google happens to own).

In my view, here’s why Facebook Messages is NO Email killer

• Too casual to have a business communication : Facebook messages is meant to be more casual in approach than an email communication. As most business communication is done through emails today , the major utility of email services is still seen in being a business communication tool rather than casual one.
• Current Email services are smarter: I see ‘Social Inbox’ for Facebook Messages as ‘Priority Inbox’ for Gmail. ‘Social Inbox’ sounds great when personal relations are concerned. ‘Priority Inbox’ works great when professional links/emails are concerned. And I happen to be satisfied with Gmail’s smart Priority Inbox, that learns from user behavior and self-optimizes future communication as per user actions.

With this service launch, Facebook is really gearing up to dominate all our communication mediums in a big way. But always remember that unified services, although being more comfortable to use, also makes you highly dependent on them. Facebook, still a casual service in my opinion, hasn’t graduated to handle all my communication, especially work related.

If Google doesn’t counter-act fast enough, future may be different than now !

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Google, the fastest growing and most desirable companies of Internet Industry, which just finished celebrating its 12th birthday, is leaving no stone unturned in dragging more users to Google Chrome(Google’s web browser) and India seems to be a hotspot for Google right now.

Today(Sept 29, 2010), Google took a big shot by publishing Full Back-Page advertisements on major newspapers across the country’s metro cities, promoting their “simple. safe. secure” Chrome web browser to the vast print media audience of our country.

The Times of India, Hindu, ET, Mint, along with several other big newspapers have the same full-page advertisement, pushing Google Chrome really hard. The covered newspapers collectively reach a large chunk of the active urban population, which is what Google is targeting here.

Google has never been too aggressive with their promotional strategies and generally prefers to spend less on direct marketing but Google Chrome is a different case altogether.Public debue of Chrome OS, Google’s biggest threat to Microsoft, is around the corner and Chrome web browser is supposed to serve as the backbone to Chrome OS. So, Chrome’s promotion makes perfect sense.

Also, Microsoft released its latest edition of web browser, IE9 Beta, just a couple of weeks back so Google has to counter that by taking some aggressive moves. So, again, Countrywide massive print ads makes absolute sense.

Interestingly, Google kicked off similar sort of Full page ad promotions through Print Media in European countries, back in late 2009 and early 2010. Below are some of those ads.

With browser wars heating up yet again and India becoming an increasingly relevant market for Internet products and services, don’t be surprised if you wake up next morning and spot Microsoft’s ads, plastered all across our daily newspapers, pushing Internet Explorer 9 into our heads !

And here comes the big news. TechCrunch has actually been acquired by AOL. Here is the official post authored by Tim Armstrong on TC that also comes with the whole press release. Looks like AOL’s CEO Tim Armstrong is surely on a shopping spree as AOL just bought Web Video Service 5 Min for over $50Mn and now TechCrunch network for an undisclosed price (rumored to be around $40Mn).

From my own perspective, i would have liked TechCrunch to remain independent and i reckon, they could grow it over $100Mn of worth for sure. The biggest advantage of staying independent is that you don’t need to bother about corporate relationships too much while writing posts that are sensitive in nature or break disruptive secrets (angelgate?). Change in ownership may affect that uniquely aggressive style of reporting. However, AOL also bought Weblogs Inc. in the past and that has hardly made any difference to Engadget or any other blog or its style of reporting so hopefully,  we may not notice any difference in TechCrunch reporting as well.

But one thing that’s out of limelight is what Jason Calacanis, Mahalo’s founder has to say about this deal. As we all know, Jason Calacanis has had deep relations with both the parties involved in the deal here. It was Jason Calacanis who created Weblogs Inc. and did that first-ever deal(worth $25Mn) of selling a blogging empire to AOL Inc. And it was the same Jason Calacanis who collaborated with Mike Arrington to set the foundation for startup launch event TechCrunch50.

Eventually, Internal conflicts started breeding and Calacanis got thrown out and TechCrunch50 got  a relaunch as TechCrunch Disrupt. On paper, if TechCrunch50 ceased to exist, Calacanis, who had equal authority on TechCrunch50 brand as Mike had, had no reasons to ask Arrington for awarding equal authority on TC Disrupt as well, but that’s on paper.

In actual, almost everyone who remains plugged in to startup world knew that TechCrunch Disrupt was just a name-change for already popular TechCrunch50 event, mainly to corner Calacanis and avoid any liabilities to him in case TechCrunch gets acquired. As tech events had become an important part of TechCrunch’s revenue machine, it was actually an evil-planned move by Arrington to sideline Jason Calacanis and eat the largest pie all alone.

When Jason heard about the rumor of TC acquisition, he tweeted

Aol is making big mistake if they buy @techcrunch. They cant keep a liability like @arrington around as public company+w/o mike it’s nothing

To an extent, Jason was correct as it’s mighty hard for any loyal TC follower(me included) to imagine Arrington being governed by someone else (Tim?) but now, it’s already a fact that TC has gone AOL so only time can tell what’s up next.

After the news of TechCrunch acquisition broke out, Jason tweeted…

It is now complete: @arrington stole @techcrunch50 from me, sold to AOL & laughed in my face. I will have my revenge:

On his blog, Jason wrote his frustration out…

Mike Arrington double crossed me,
left me for dead to make a quick buck
He stole from me, and my family.

On the birth of my daughter you didn’t call
You sent no flowers or tidings of AOL.
Three months later you laughed in my face
While you explained how you would screw me.

I will have my revenge, in this life
*not* the next.

I’m coming, and you will learn what
a lack of loyalty and honor brings sir.
I will not rest until vengeance is mine.

Personally speaking, i tend to agree with Jason’s school of ethics more than often, whether it be about Facebook or any other company and with the kind of picture that i have about Michael Arrington(after being a close follower of him since late 2007),  I voice my support for Jason and wish may Arrington get the taste of his own medicine, someday !

This ever-growing hunger of new breed of consumerist-major generation has led to fierce competition at almost every tech landscape you talk about. Every major technology company today is either busy defending its own once-monopolistic business (Microsoft: Windows & Office, Google: Search & Advertising), aggressively invading into other’s businesses(Microsoft:Bing, Google: Chrome OS) or competing to dominate future-centric markets (Apple,Google, Microsoft, RIM, Nokia, HP: Mobile OS and Apps).

And quite recently, an untouched breed has started to appear across tech world, which may soon define an all new category of devices, the category of Touch-enabled Tablet devices. It’s also the category that’s currently synonymized with Apple iPad, a meticulously crafted evidence of technological advancement, built by Apple.

Honestly, i can’t stop admiring iPad and there are countless reasons for that. Being a gadget freak myself, i am sold to the beauty of iPad already and want to own it anyway.

Still,  I am scared of buying an iPad. Sounds strange ?. Here’s why i think so…

• I own a Windows PC not an iMac
• I own a Dell Laptop, not a Macbook
• I own a Sony MP3 Player, not an iPod
• I own a Motorola Droid(Android), not an iPhone

In short, I am happy keeping myself away from buying anything ‘Apple’. I am aware that Apple produces the best breed of desktop machines(iMac), the best laptops (Macbook), the best Music player(iPod) or possibly the best smartphone till date (iPhone, although i would love to argue on this), but all of that fails to convince me to turn to Apple.

Although I would have loved using that iMac ‘Magic Mouse’ or using that long battery Macbook or that beautiful iPhone etc etc but i am happy with my existing set of gadgets and don’t feel the need to expend unnecessarily over Apple’s high priced product line, just because that’s ‘cool’ or more ‘aesthetic’ and stuff like that.

But iPad has a different story altogether. When i think of consumer-oriented touch slate devices, i find no options but the iPad. It’s something that’s a little annoying to me as lack of options invites frustration to anyone (barring Apple Fanboys, of course) and we, the consumers are not used to having zero options. We choose, not accept !

Now, i admit that Apple has produced a futuristic device in the form of iPad and i would rather love falling for an iPad rather than waiting for HP or Acer or any other OEM to launch an iPad competitor.

But still, i am scared of buying an iPad. Not because…

• I hate iPad (i already said i love it!)
• I hate Apple (No, I admire Apple as a company for all its achievements and successfully building an absurdly religious cult)
• I hate Apple products(Again, i don’t hate Apple products. They’re too awesome to hate )

I am scared of buying iPad because i am scared of becoming yet another Absurdly religious Apple Fanboy !

It’s a human tendency to admire and defend what you own. It’s because you’re not defending the ‘product’ you bought, you are actually defending “your decision” of buying that product.

And i realize that once i buy an iPad, i won’t be able to stop myself showing it off to every other guy and explaining folks why this sleek gadget is ‘magical’, ‘revolutionary’ , ‘extraordinary’ etc etc, an early symptom of becoming a Fanboy.

I can foresee that soon after buying an iPad and unleashing its crafted beauty, i will turn so addicted with it that i will start wondering how was i bearing those clumsy, non-glittering, poorly designed ‘Non-Apple’ gadgets i had been using all along.

And eventually, I will replace my PC with an iMac, my Dell laptop with a Macbook and my Droid with an iPhone. In other words, i will surrender to the Cult of Mac by becoming a part of it. All this transition won’t happen immediately but once all my existing device approach their expiry, i won’t choose anything but Apple’s.

Although iPad would cost me just $499 or more but in a couple of years, i will transform into an ATM machine for Apple, who will be ready to spare hundreds, if not thousands of dollars on every product launched by Apple and plenty of apps, music and other stuff from iTunes.

Ultimately, i will start to prefer ‘Apple‘ over ‘Options‘, ‘Affordability‘ & ‘Openness’. I will become a devoted Apple Fanboy !

All the above thoughts scare me so much that i prefer abstaining from taking that first step(buying an iPad) towards the Black Hole(Apple’s Ecosystem).

As I am quite happy with my Android smartphone(Droid) so far, i would love to buy an Android Tablet/Slate, as and when it hits the shelves. Till then, I better avoid thinking about iPad anymore !

Apple has announced to give away free bumpers/cases to every iPhone 4 buyer(existing and future). Those who already purchased the bumper at their expense, will get full refund from Apple.

As speculated by us earlier, this act from Apple was much expected and honestly speaking, these rubber bumpers really saved Apple from falling into deep trap of Death grip.

However, it was odd to hear from Apple that they will stop handing out free bumpers to buyers who make iPhone 4′s purchase after September 30. Yeah, September 30 is the final deadline for getting free bumpers from Apple.

During the press conference, Steve Jobs explained all the facts and figures regarding the Antenna issues such as percentage of affected users, call drop rate, iPhone 4 return rate, among other things and reiterated that signal attenuation is a fact of life.

He went further saying that Apple cares about every single affected Apple customer and that’s why they’re giving away free bumpers, hence fixing all antenna issues, once for all.

We guess, Apple has done the needful, for now at least  but it would still be sad to see that meticulously crafted, beautiful iPhone 4, covered with colorful (but ugly) rubber bumpers, which, in our opinion, gives iPhone 4 a toy like appearance.

As Apple has just announced an emergency press conference regarding iPhone 4 on friday with only handful of Media journos on their Invite list, industry pundits are strongly pointing over some major announcement from Apple regarding the obvious issue of flawed antenna design.

It is obvious that consumers are plain unhappy with Apple at the moment and Apple can’t afford to loose all its priceless credibility earned over decades over this antenna issue so Apple has to address the problem and fix it.

Experts are estimating three possible ‘fixes’ from here…

1. iOS 4.01 Software Update : This is what Apple promised a week back and this software update is most likely to keep everything as it is. Now that iOS 4.01 update has already gone in the hands of developers, it’s more or less confirmed that software update will prove worthless to the consumers. In our opinion, Apple knows all of this very well and is not holding an emergency conference on Friday for releasing an ineffective software update. They’re onto something serious here !

2. Total Recall:  Few media reports are suggesting that total iPhone recall is inevitable and Apple will have to bear billions of dollars of expenses to shield their priceless reputation from getting tarnished anymore. In our opinion, it is the worst that can happen to Apple and Apple is most unlikely to do so as that will call out for primary level manufacturing alternations which is next to impossible. Apple ‘luckily’ has an alternative solution(look below) to put forward.

3. Free Bumpers: This is by far the most feasible alternative that can save Apple from fast growing consumer & media fury. Bumpers are cheap and they solve the signal attenuation problem. In some vague estimation, Apple will have to bear only $1 per bumper if it decides to give it for free to every iPhone buyer. This would hardly affect Apple as they have tens of billions of cash in the bank already. For Apple, it would be like making $1 lesser profit on every iPhone sale. In our opinion, Apple is lucky enough that consumers are willing to accept this proposed solution of ruining the aesthetics of iPhone 4 by an ugly rubber bumper. And Apple will likely do so to cover their sinful act.

But the most interesting thing on friday announcement is going to be Apple’s admission of the fact that iPhone 4′s antenna design is an engineering defect or just ‘flawed’. Till date, Apple has bluntly refused any allegations or claims that Antenna design is flawed and now Apple will be forced to admit that “they were wrong”.

On the other side, Android’s most successful device till date, touted as “iDon’t Killer” from day one, the ‘Motorola Droid’, is going to drop its bigger(4.3 inch, 8MP) brother, Droid X today itself. And queues in front of Motorola stores have already started to appear.

This would put a huge pressure on Apple as extreme media outrage might convince Apple fanboys to return their iPhone 4 units and future iPhone 4 buyers might actually grab Droid X to play safe than sorry.

We will keep an eye on friday announcement. Stay tuned !