Credit: Priceonomics

Priceonomics, which keeps track of the resale value of items like cars, bikes and gadgets, published a report Wednesday that shows how the value of iPhones, Android devices and BlackBerrys hold up over time. Short answer: iPhones, even years-old models, retain their value the longest, which means iPhone owners can recoup the most money when they go to resell their phones.

Here’s the method they  used:

We measure depreciation by comparing a phone’s current used price to its new price (without a contract) the day it was released. We examined all iPhone models and the 70 most popular Androids and 30 most popular BlackBerry models. We split phones into five different cohorts (newly released, 1, 2, 3, and 4 year-old phones). We then calculated which phones had the best resale by cohort, as well as which platforms in aggregate tended to retain their value the most.

The highest quality phones should have the best resale values over time and crappier phones should depreciate the fastest. The evidence is clear – the winner is the iPhone.

After crunching the data they came up with a series of charts, like one that shows that after owning a smartphone for 18 months, iPhone owners can resell theirs for 53 percent of the original price, Android owners for 42 percent and BlackBerry owners for 41 percent of the original price.

That part won’t be news to people who make a habit of reselling their old iPhone before or right after buying a new one a new one. There are sites like Gazelle.com, eBay and NextWorth.com that regularly buy used iPhones, BlackBerrys and Android phones in order to resell them. The iPhone is always the easiest to resell and will go for a decently high price if you time it right.

But all is not lost for penny-pinching Android owners. One caveat to the data that Priceonomics found is that less expensive Android phones sold by prepaid operators do hold their value much better than their pricier Google-powered brethren, probably because those phones are highly subsidized by the operators. Specifically, the Motorola Triumph, HTC Wildfire and Samsung Exhibit 4G on average keep up to 86 percent of the original value.

Be sure to check out the original post for more interesting data.

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A few weeks ago when Paul Walborsky, CEO of GigaOM, came to the board and suggested that we should try and acquire paidContent, my fellow board members — Jon Callaghan (True Ventures), Ammar Hanafi (Alloy Ventures) and Kevin Brown (Reed Elsevier Ventures) — didn’t hesitate for a minute. The ethos of paidContent and our company are in sync. GigaOM’s core belief is that as connectivity becomes ubiquitous, it changes everything from society to business to we the people. paidContent from the very beginning has been built on the idea that connectedness is and will change media. It makes perfect sense for us to team up. Since then, Paul and his team worked tirelessly to make it happen.

OK, now you know what. Let me tell you why.

Now, why are we doing this deal, clearly the biggest of our five-and-a-half-year history? Two simple but equally powerful reasons — the first and perhaps most important reason: people. I have been an admirer of paidContent’s editorial team from the very beginning of its journey. Rafat Ali and Staci Kramer were two of my favorite writers in the early days of professional blogging. And while Rafat (who is on our board of advisers) has moved on to new things, I am glad to have Staci join us. She has been instrumental in building ContentNext from the ground up, and in addition to writing, she has been building the company’s event business. I am thrilled to announce that she will remain the editor of paidContent.

Ernie Sander who spearheads the ContentNext editorial operations is the kind of veteran everyone on our team, including me, can learn from. And for that precise reason, Ernie is going to become the executive editor of our sprawling online editorial operations. Our managing editor, Nicole Solis, is being promoted to VP of Editorial Operations. And then there is the most awesome team of journalists — Robert Andrews, Tom Krazit, Daniel Frankel, Laura Hazard Owen, Jeff Roberts and Amanda Natividad. In addition there are a wonderful group of technology, business and sales people who are joining our company. I welcome them all to our growing family and can’t wait to break bread with them in weeks to come.

Location, location, location

These fine folks are actually going to help bolster our presence in New York and help increase our footprint in Europe, a region of key strategic focus for GigaOM. (We will be hosting Structure:Europe in Amsterdam, October 16-17.) With this deal, we are really pleased that one of the most forward-looking media outlets around, Guardian News & Media, will become a shareholder in our business.

As you all know, I am (and will always be) a displaced New Yorker; New York City is my spiritual home. By increasing our footprint in the capital of the world, I would get a chance to go back more often. But it’s not an emotional tug that is driving us to this decision. New York is fast becoming a major technology hub, as Ryan Kim outlined in his recent post. And we want to expand our coverage to Boston — thanks to Barb Darrow who joined us several months ago — and the Washington DC corridor as well. paidContent’s New York City offices are now GigaOM East.

Media is the new Wild West

We are quite strategic about our acquisitions — we acquire media entities only if we love the people and believe that we are at the starting phase of a trend. In 2008, we acquired jkOnTheRun as our tip of the hat to the growing demand for mobile devices and the changes it would bring into society. Later that year, we brought in The Apple Blog because we knew the best was yet to come for Apple. Both of those acquisitions have helped GigaOM cover the issues that matter most to our ultimate customers — you, the reader — in a smart, sensible fashion.

“The question that mass amateurization poses to traditional media is ‘What happens when the costs of reproduction and distribution go away? What happens when there is nothing unique about publishing anymore because users can do it for themselves?’ We are now starting to see that question being answered.”— Clay Shirky

Shirky’s observation means that we are in a time of chaos where the very idea of media is being questioned. And as a Chinese proverb says, from chaos emerges opportunity. I believe the best is yet to come for media.

Over the past few years we have started to see the transformation of media by new technologies, new methods of distribution and newer ways to consume information. Mathew Ingram has been writing about these disruptions on a regular basis, and now we are going to double down on what we think is a great new chapter in the media industry.

I have always believed that we’ve got to stop thinking of media as what it was and focus on more of what it could be. In the world of plenty, the only currency is attention and attention is what defines “media.” Zynga is fighting Hollywood for attention (and winning). Instagram is taking moments away from other media. They have attention. There are old companies that are dying and new ones that are being invented. We’re eager to expand our coverage of social and digital media editorially, in our research and at our events. paidContent is the best chronicler of the media industry, and by blending their coverage with ours, we hope to watch this fast-changing industry ever more closely.

Please join me in welcoming the ContentNext team!

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To set up, Nowbox asks users to specify categories of entertainment that are of interest to them, then to link their YouTube, Facebook and Twitter accounts. Once that’s done, they’ll be shown a TV guide-like navigation pane that will look familiar to anyone who’s ever seen a cable channel guide. All of which is the point — Nowbox demystifies the online video experience by serving up channels in the same way most viewers are already used to seeing them.

It has a few other perks as well: for one thing, users are served up a continuous stream of videos, making online video viewing more akin to the type of non-stop stream they’re used to seeing when watching regular TV. Users can swipe back and forth through videos on a particular channel, and since Nowbox pre-caches those videos, they play pretty much instantaneously. Users can star videos as favorites, save them for later or share with friends and followers on social networks.

With more than half a million video views under its belt in less than two months since launch, Nowbox is expanding the app’s feature set to make it even easier to discover new content. For one thing, Nowbox has added a channel of video recommendations based on the categories of content that users signed up for. It’s also added an indicator to highlight new videos as they appear in a user’s channel lineup.

Nowbox is just one of many apps focused on improving discovery of streaming video on the iPad. Other competitors include apps like Showyou, Squrl and the Boxee iPad app. The hope is that Nowbox’s unique channel guide approach, as well as its new features, will extend the play time that users spend with the app. Those users are already showing pretty strong engagement, however: Nowbox founder Thomas Pun told me that users spend 18 minutes with the app per session on average.

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The groups say they will deliver the petitions in person in Washington, D.C., New York City, San Fransisco, London, Sydney and Bangalore and will carry signs and leaflets.

The SumOfUs petition has more than 56,000 electronic signatures so far. According to the grassroots group, more than 35,000 of those signatures belong to people who say they are current Apple customers — 20,000 of them are said to be iPhone owners. The number includes Taren Stinebrickner-Kauffman, SumOfUs’ executive director, who says she love her iPhone but doesn’t “love having to support sweatshops.”

In the press release she adds:

“Apple’s attention to detail is famous, and the only way they could fail to be aware of dozens of worker deaths, of child labor, of exposure to neurotoxins is through willful ignorance. That’s why our members are asking Apple to clean up its supply chains in time to make the iPhone 5 its first ethically produced product.”

Apple has said it cares about workers and says it’s doing all it can to improve conditions at factories like Foxconn’s. CEO Tim Cook wrote in an internal email to employees earlier this month, “We care about every worker in our worldwide supply chain. Any accident is deeply troubling, and any issue with working conditions is cause for concern. Any suggestion that we don’t care is patently false and offensive to us.”

But even if that is true, it doesn’t change the fact that some iPhone owners and other concerned citizens aren’t satisfied with the current status of those factories, how workers are treated and paid, and will do what they can to continue to make this an issue for Apple.

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That’s because of the 1.8 million iPhones the carrier sold, 40 percent of them went to new customers that came to the carrier for the iPhone. We knew the iPhone was fairly popular on Sprint’s network — the carrier sold out of its stock of the iPhone 4S the first day it was available back in October.

Although 1.8 million iPhones may pale in comparison to its competitors, it was Sprint’s first quarter selling the iPhone, after all. AT&T sold 7.6 million iPhones during the quarter, but the carrier had a nearly four-year head start on Sprint. Verizon, meanwhile, sold 4.2 million iPhones last quarter.

While new customers may be coming in the door, it’s still costing Spring some extra dough. The carrier said Wednesday that the costs of subsidies it paid during the quarter went up from $1.2 billion to $1.7 billion in the last year, which was ”primarily due to the launch of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S, which on average carry a higher subsidy rate per handset as compared to other handsets.”

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In the report by technology trade group TechNet, Michael Mandel of the South Mountain Economics, who conducted the research, found that 311,000 app-related jobs have been generated and another 155,000 jobs have also been indirectly created from the app boom. The figures are estimates and are based on calculations on the existing market for app-related jobs. Mandel warns that the figures could represent “jobs not lost” rather than net jobs gained.

But if the latter is true, it starts to paint a broader picture of the economic benefit from apps, which have only really been around in force for the last four years. We’ve already talked about some of the revenue brought in by apps and where it’s forecast to hit. Gartner said last year it expected mobile app stores to generate $15 billion in revenue in 2011. But it’s interesting to see how many actual jobs might be at work in this emerging economy. App jobs can be found in big software and gaming companies like Electronic Arts and Zynga to small one person start-ups working out of a home. Big companies are also devoting more and more resources to apps, and as apps help companies grow, it fuels the need for more jobs in human resources, sales, marketing and other non-technical positions. There’s also an emerging app development services economy growing out of the app boom.

The app economy has been a major engine for job growth in an otherwise sluggish labor market, said Mandel. And it’s likely to keep growing as wireless and social platforms expand.

Mandel arrived at his estimates by looking at the number of unique “help wanted” ads for apps in the the Conference Board HWOL database. He then factored in the historical rate in the computer and mathematics industry for employment ads compared to existing jobs. And then he applied a multiplier to estimate the number of indirect jobs created by apps.

The highest number of app positions in a metro area were created in the New York-New Jersey-Long Island area (9.2 percent), followed by San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont (8.5 percent),  San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara (6.3 percent) and the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue (5.7 percent) area. Overall, California generated the most app jobs by far with 23.8 percent of all jobs, followed by New York (6.9 percent) and Washington (6.4 percent).

These are still early days and that’s why Mandel was forced to come up with his own estimates, because there is no good tracking done by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But I think we’re likely to see a lot more growth, especially as smartphone and tablet penetration increases.

As I wrote earlier, consumers are increasingly favoring apps over a browser in part because it’s a pretty streamlined experience that is dedicated to one purpose. Over time, we will likely see the growth in app jobs level off as more companies look to leverage the web and build more cross-platform HTML5 web apps. But for now, there’s still a lot of interest in native apps that are built atop popular platforms. And that means this is where to find a lot of new jobs.

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Interestingly enough, I was discussing the possibility of Apple’s partnering with operators the other day at lunch, before the Bloomberg piece came out. That first piece might seem like a fluke, as it was written based on an analyst note. But with Tuesday’s Globe and Mail story, it seems more likely that the hardware giant is indeed considering some sort of partnership approach to tackling the TV market.

The move isn’t totally unprecedented: After all, Dish Network was one of Google TV’s launch partners, and Verizon has partnered with Microsoft to make its FiOS TV service accessible through the new Xbox Live user interface.

All the content, none of the fuss

By partnering with pay TV operators, Apple would immediately gain access to all the TV content that viewers have come to expect, without having to strike up carriage deals of its own. It is not alone in pursuing this strategy: Microsoft’s Xbox 360, for instance, can be used as a set-top box by AT&T U-Verse and Verizon FiOS subscribers.

In the FiOS case, the program data and channel lineup will be deeply integrated with the Xbox Live service and Bing search engine, which will let viewers discover live TV and video-on-demand content alongside streaming content from services like the Zune Marketplace, Netflix, Hulu Plus, Vudu and YouTube.

I could see Apple’s doing something similar by allowing operator partners to build integrated apps into the new device, which could be used to control channel lineups and program discovery. For Apple, such a move would give it the content it needs to be relevant but allow it to control the overall user experience of search, discovery and navigation.

But what would the operators get out of it? Well, for one thing, integration with the Apple iTV could potentially give them a competitive advantage over their peers. In the U.S., Apple already has relationships with AT&T and Verizon, both of whom could stand to benefit from having the best new iDevice available for customers as they pitch their IPTV services against the more traditional cable offerings. Those operators could be incentivized to push the iTV to their customers and could act as an additional distribution outlet, on top of Apple Stores and the company’s existing big box retail partnerships.

Could AT&T help you buy an iTV?

There is even the possibility that Apple could bring the same subsidy model that exists in the mobile space to TV operators. To a certain extent, carriers already subsidize TV hardware by making set-top boxes available to customers. Assuming an Apple TV product would enable those carriers to deliver cloud- and IP-based programming guides, it could act as a set-top box replacement. Whatever money was being put toward that hardware could be committed to reducing the cost of an Apple iTV purchased by subscribers.

A carrier subsidy could potentially boost adoption for an Apple device’s being launched in a market with traditionally long replacement cycles. Some believe that any introductory Apple TV product would be sold at a premium over existing smart TVs, and a recent Best Buy survey lends some credence to this belief, polling users if they would spend $1,499 for a 42-inch Apple TV device. I personally doubt that Apple would introduce a new product priced so far above existing products, but if there is any premium a subsidy could bring products within parity. And if there isn’t a premium, a subsidy could make the product all that more attractive.

ITV is not just for partners

I don’t believe that any operator partnerships Apple strikes would be exclusive. In the U.S., Apple would likely partner with multiple providers, since their services are only available in certain geographies. As noted above, AT&T and Verizon are the most likely partners in the U.S., but I don’t think Apple would shy away from the same type of deal with a company like Comcast.

Nor would the Apple TV be “broken” if purchased direct from a retailer or if a consumer doesn’t subscribe to an Apple partner. She will get all the same third-party apps and TV coming from her set-top box. There is even the possibility that non-partners could build their own apps for device search and navigation, in the same way that Comcast, Time Warner Cable and others have built iPad apps that can be used as remote controls. But it won’t have the same tight program guide integration. And if there are subsidies involved, it wouldn’t be as cheap as it would be from Apple’s partners.

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What You Need to Get Started

To start, you will also need an HDTV with an Apple TV attached, an iPhone 4S and a free Skype account. Why Skype and not FaceTime?  Well there are many more Skype users than FaceTime users. And quite frankly, it is much easier to get all members of the family up and running with a free Skype account than to initialize everyone’s iOS and Mac devices with FaceTime.

Prepare the Car Mount

Most iPhone docks are designed for someone sitting at a desk. What is needed is a better mount that can allow the iPhone to be better positioned for larger settings.  Take any decent smartphone car mount with a suction cup, like this one from Arkon for $15 on Amazon. The suction cup needs a smooth surface to attach to, so try mounting it to any household hand mirror. This set up gives extra stability to the video and the added ability to pass the camera in the mount around easily. The great thing about the car mount from Arkon is that it is just about infinitely adjustable, so no matter how or where you need to place the hand mirror you can angle the iPhone the way you want. And if you happen not to have anywhere to place the hand mirror, just tack up a nail and hang the hand mirror upside down on the wall.  Just don’t lock in the iPhone 4S before you make the video call. (The mount’s quick release allows one to attach and detach the iPhone quickly and easily.) Wait until after the call has been established before you put the iPhone into the car mount attached to the hand mirror.

Initiate the Video Call

Placing a video call on Skype with an iPhone is just as easy as chatting or placing a voice call.  To increase the quality of the video once the call is established, be sure to use the back camera of the iPhone. Then double click the phone’s Home button and swipe left twice to reveal the volume and Airplay buttons. To display the call on the big screen, just click on the Apple TV you want to use and turn on Mirroring. Once you’ve done that, mount the iPhone in the car mount and experience video calls on the big screen. As a side note, I have found that when placing Mac-to-iPhone Skype video calls, it is easier to establish a video connection when the call originates from the Mac.

If this solution works great for you, you can always shop around for a more attractive mounting solution.  You could even invest in a mountable surface that permanently affixes itself to the wall just above your HDTV. For instance, the top shelf of my main entertainment system is made of glass, so I don’t really need a mirror in that room of the house.  There are just as many car mounts on the market as there are solutions on how to mount them on or near an HDTV.

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Before you think, “say what?” have a gander at this 400x video scan of a tubular adenoma of the colon, taken with an iPhone 4S and the Skylight, a smartphone adapter for microscopes that’s now a Kickstarter project.

The SkyLight actually works with nearly any other smartphone as well, but it should excel with an iPhone 4S, if not some of the high-end Nokia models that use superb optics. Most focusing is done on the microscope itself, but the SkyLight relies upon a smartphone’s auto-focus feature for fine focusing.

This Kickstarter project already raised more than $22,000, which is greater than the $15,000 goal originally set. CSI types can still get in on the action with a pledge of $60 or more for a SkyLight. The microscope? You’ll have to supply that yourself.

I especially like how you can record video through the microscope with a SkyLight. Kids telling parents about what they saw in biology class is one thing; to share an actual video is quite a different experience.

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Apple’s 37 million iPhones sold last quarter were good enough to just eke out a win in smartphones sold during the final three months of 2011. Meanwhile, Samsung shipped 36 million units during the same time frame, according to IDC.

But for all of 2011, Samsung actually shipped the most smartphones, to the tune of 94 million units, IDC says. That’s an increase in shipments of 310 percent for the company compared to 2010, when the company shipped just 22.9 million smartphones — a huge growth rate.

Apple was very close behind, with 93.2 million iPhones shipped during 2011, which, at 96 percent for the year, is also impressive growth but nowhere near Samsung’s amazing showing.

If you’ve been following along then it won’t be a surprise that the rest of the smartphone pack failed to keep pace with these two. Nokia was a distant third for the year with 77.3 million smartphones shipped, followed by RIM with 51.1 BlackBerrys shipped, and HTC with 43.5 million units.

The final tally for 2011 worldwide market share finds Samsung with a 19.1 percent share, and Apple with a 19 percent share. Some might say that’s too close to call. Whatever the exact numbers are, the real story is clearly how over the course of 2011 the smartphone market has coalesced around these two companies. I’d say 2012 is going to be a very interesting year in smartphones.

Note: This story originally misattributed the data to The NPD Group. The report is from IDC.

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• Apple has almost $100 billion in cash now.
• Cook told investors and reporters late last year he wasn’t “religious” about holding cash, a subtle but important difference in the attitude Steve Jobs has long had about Apple’s cash holdings.
• CFO Peter Oppenheimer shared several weeks ago that the company is “actively discussing” what to do with all that money.
• People who could be in a position to know are starting to talk openly about it.

A UBS analyst says Apple has been soliciting opinions from investors on what to do with the money. We all know what investors want Apple to do:  give it back to shareholders.

And on Monday, Fortune editor Adam Lashinsky, author of the just-released (and excellent) Inside Apple, writes that we should expect to hear about AAPL owners getting a dividend “sooner rather than later.” As someone who’s demonstrated he knows a thing or two about what goes on inside 1 Infinite Loop, this is yet another good indication Apple is thinking differently about its money these days. As Lashinsky points out, what else will they do with it?:

[W]hat’s becoming increasingly clear is that Apple has a success problem on its hands: It has run out of ways to responsibly spend its profits. It has never done what any other big company would view as a major acquisition. Silicon Valley investment bankers desperately would like to see Apple acquire Twitter, for example. But this would be so contrary to the Apple acquisition mindset that it’s hard to imagine.

Apple’s annual shareholder meeting is coming up on February 23. These kinds of meetings can be somewhat of a snooze. Perhaps this year edition will have a few fireworks.

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1. The early Android handset makers are free-falling. In April of last year I noted that Android was a boost to hardware makers that embraced the platform early. Specifically, I saw that an Android strategy helped Motorola trim losses while HTC was growing faster than a field of bamboo. Fast-forward to today and Google is attempting to snap up Motorola Mobility even as Moto has faltered. And HTC? Monday confirmed what we reported late last year: The rising star has fallen and isn’t meeting expectations.
2. Apple is grabbing a huge share of mobile revenues and profits. We often talk about smartphone sales market share, which is important to a point, but money keeps a business afloat. And Apple is sucking most of it out of the mobile market. According to the excellent Asymco blog, Apple has been the top handset maker in terms of operating profits for the past 13 quarters running. It has 75 percent of the market’s profit share and 39 percent of its revenue. With the exception of Samsung, Android competitors are beginning to fade away; you can’t grow a business when your product sales are in decline and you are earning less money on such products.
   
3. The top three smartphones are all iPhones. This data point comes from NPD on Monday: Of the top five smartphones sold in the U.S. in the last quarter of 2011, the top three are all iPhones. Samsung’s Galaxy S II and Galaxy S 4G took the fourth and fifth spots. Why is this a problem for Android handset makers? Because consumers are more willing to buy the reduced-priced iPhone 4 or 3GS — handsets that are more than a year or two old — than some of the newer Android handsets. There are plenty of low-cost Android models that compete well on price, but consumers don’t think they compete well on the experience. If they did, they would bypass Apple’s older phones.
4. First-time buyers are picking Android, but . . . NPD did note that first-time smartphone buyers favor Android over iOS (54 percent versus 34 percent), and I suspect that is mainly due to price. But these folks will be second-time smartphone buyers in the future and may be willing to spend more for an iPhone unless Android handset makers can give them a reason to stick with the platform. And now that the U.S. has over 50 percent smartphone penetration, the pool of first-time buyers will be shrinking, not growing.
5. Even now, there are still few apps hitting Android before iOS. One of the reasons I pay attention to smartphone sales by platform is because of developers. Not every software shop can support every operating system, so common sense dictates that most devs will aim their apps at the largest audience possible. But even with Android sales growing fast over the past two years, very few developers bypass iOS as the first platform to develop for. They are simply making more money with iOS, so that is where the top-tier apps start out, which in turn helps boost handset sales. I don’t see any signs of this changing either. Even for apps on both platforms, it often takes time for the Android version to see parity with its iOS counterpart. Monday’s Android update of Rdio is a perfect example; until Monday, I have used the app on my iPhone instead of my Galaxy Nexus because it was simply better.
6. Android no longer has a killer app. Originally Android offered the best support for Gmail services by far, but over time Google has brought the iOS version to near parity. I still think the best Gmail experience is on an Android phone and the free, exclusive Google Navigation is great on Android, but it is not a killer app. Even worse: Google can’t cease development on iOS at this point, else users will leave its services altogether. Google can’t afford for that to happen, because it gets data from these users, which feeds its primary revenue stream: personalized advertising. Even as an Android user, I can easily make do using Gmail, Google Voice, Google+ and other Google services on iOS. I suspect many mainstream consumers can too.
7. There is less of a lock-in cost to keep people on Android. I looked into lock-in costs back in 2010 as I saw how these could sway consumers to stick with a platform. I still believe there is a smartphone lock-in cost: Moving to another platform could cost $100, $200 or more to replace apps. But I am starting to believe there is less of a lock-in to keep people on Android. Why? Most of the heavily downloaded apps are free. Not all of them, of course, but far more of the top Android apps are free versus those in the iTunes App Store. Without this financial barrier, it is easier to switch from Android to iOS. Likewise, it is more of a deterrent to move in the opposite direction.

None of my points here are intended to suggest that one platform is better or worse than the other. As long as I have been covering mobile technology online — it will be 10 years in 2013 — I have always stood by one mantra: Use the best mobile device for your own needs. And I will continue to practice what I preach. Although I have an iPhone 4S, on 9 days out of 10, I carry my Galaxy Nexus handset. I have an iPad 2, but that’s relegated for specific use cases; my Galaxy Tab 7.7 is the tablet I take everywhere.

Independent of my own Android use, there are many reasons to suspect that Android’s growth will continue along the upward path it has seen for the past few years. But Apple’s iOS platform simply has strong momentum that is going to slow Android down as it forces some handset makers to scramble. These will likely gravitate toward the alternative of Windows Phone. Companies are likely to see growth there, but given the history of Android, as well as what I expect from its future, will the story remain the same?

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The Devium Dash is a 4-inch-by-7-inch unit that is installed the same way as an in-dash GPS unit, but it replaces your whole stereo.  It’s a pretty plain design, with a slot to pop in an iPhone or an iPod touch and scroll knob. Founder Jeff Lizer says other smartphones will fit eventually too, but he started off with the original design for the iPhone because he “had to focus on a single product to get this right.”

The product’s information page says that your iPhone will fit with or without the rubber bumper that many people use. And we shouldn’t fret if Apple changes the body style for its next iPhone, he writes: ”I know the iPhone ’5′ may be released this summer and if its dimensions are similar to the current iPhones then it will work without purchasing a new faceplate. If the new iPhone varies too much, a new faceplate will be developed and released as soon as possible.”

Other interesting specs, according to the official site for Devium Dash:

Right now, Devium Dash is a Kickstarter project and is a little under halfway to its $45,000 funding goal. The company seems confident they’ll meet the goal and start producing units by July — the price will be $300 at retail. Those who cough up $250 now will get a unit when they start shipping, according to an announcement made Monday.

Speaking from experience, it’s amazing how out-of-date even a pretty nice two-year-old car’s stereo can be. It has a CD player and a digital interface, but all I really want to do is listen to my iTunes playlists anyway. My car did come with a 30-pin connector inside the middle console that lets you plug in an iPhone or iPod and control the device through the car’s dashboard. But the car’s frustrating interface uses buttons you click and a wheel you scroll, which is a pain when you’re used to touchscreen tapping or scrolling when selecting your music.

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“Android has been criticized for offering a more complex user experience than its competitors, but the company’s wide carrier support and large app selection is appealing to new smartphone customers,”  said Ross Rubin, executive director of Connected Intelligence for The NPD Group, in a statement. “Android’s support of LTE at Verizon has also made it the exclusive choice for customers who want to take advantage of that carrier’s fastest network.”

Price would seem to be a factor, since Android handset makers like HTC, LG  and Motorola make many lower-tier phones that far undercut the latest iPhone 4S. But viewing Android’s success solely in terms of price doesn’t paint the whole picture as evidenced by NPD’s sales numbers for the iPhone 3GS, which AT&T is giving away for free with a two-year contract. The 4S outsold the 3GS five to one, despite the latter’s steep discount. The iPhone 4S also outsold the 4 – which unlike the 3GS is available on three of the four nationwide networks – by 75 percent, according to NPD. If price was the biggest factor, customers had plenty of cheap iPhone options to choose from.

In addition, customers buying Android devices aren’t simply gravitating toward cheap phones. The Samsung S II and the Galaxy S 4G – handsets that measure up to the iPhone both on features and price — were the fourth and fifth best selling devices in the fourth quarter, behind the three commercially available iPhone models.

Still, the average selling price for a U.S. smartphone in the fourth quarter was $143, up from $135 in the third quarter, but down from $149 year-over-year. The release of the iPhone 4S last fall is responsible for the big quarter-over-quarter bump in average selling prices, but Android seems to be driving a long-term decline in overall U.S. smartphone pricing.

That could be both good news and bad news for the handset makers that feed the lower-end of the market. There’s still plenty of growth left in smartphones with less than 50 percent penetration in the U.S. HTC, Moto and LG have all been suffering in the smart device market – HTC just posted another weak quarter. While they could potentially take a big share of the remaining market by selling cheaper, lower-margin devices, they might not be able to achieve much in the way of follow-up. When it comes to buying their next more-expensive smartphones, those customers seem to be choosing Apple and Samsung.

Image courtesy of Flickr user geoliv

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The Nest thermostat (in cooling mode).

Thermostat giant Honeywell has filed a lawsuit alleging patent infringement by the buzzy Silicon Valley startup Nest Labs, which makes a smart learning thermostat. Honeywell has spent decades developing thermostat technology and just last week the company told me it had developed and tested learning thermostat technology, like the kind Nest has introduced, but that it had decided not to commercialize the learning tech after weak user response.

Honeywell says its patent infringement lawsuit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court in Minnesota and also targets Best Buy that sells the Nest tech, applies to thermostat intellectual property including:

• Natural Language Installer Set Up for Controller
• Controller Interface with Dynamic Schedule Display
• HVAC Controller
• Thermostat with Mechanical User Interface
• Thermostat with Offset Drive
• Power Stealing Control Devices
• Profile Based Method for Deriving a Temperature Setpoint Using a ‘Delta’ Based On Cross-Indexing a Received Price-Point Level Signal.

Beth Wozniak, president, Honeywell Environmental and Combustion Controls, said in a statement about the lawsuit that “Competition is good and we welcome it, but we will not stand by while competitors, large or small, offer products that infringe on our intellectual property.”

I met with Wozniak last week and she told me that connected thermostats are still a small part of Honeywell’s overall thermostat sales, and that it’s the very early days of the connected thermostat market. Honeywell sells a whole host of other connected home products such as humidifiers and security systems, and a “total connected home system.” Honeywell has been focused on adding intelligence to digital and connected thermostats through simple UI, mobile apps, and partnerships like its one with Opower.

Energy software startup Opower will be providing the analytics and data to help Honeywell use home and building thermostats for demand response programs, where utilities can ask home owners to turn down their heating and cooling slightly during peak times of day. The Opower thermostats are being piloted with utilities right now, including at PG&E.

Nest officially launched its learning thermostat late last year, and the product was designed and created by Tony Fadell, the former chief architect at Apple, who led the development of the iPod and the first three versions of the iPhone. The company is backed by funding from Kleiner Perkins, Google Ventures and Al Gore’s investment fund. Nest says it has developed the world’s first learning thermostat and that its thermostat can save home owners 20 to 30 percent on their energy bills.

Here’s an unboxing of the Nest thermostat:

And an onstage interview with Tony Fadell, founder of Nest:

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In the first quarter, HTC said it was expecting revenue of between 65 billion and 70 billion Taiwanese dollars or $2.20-2.37 billion, which could amount to as much as a 36 percent drop from the previous quarter. Analysts had expected HTC to generate $89.64 billion or $3.04 billion in revenue this quarter. HTC had previously released unaudited results for the fourth quarter but the forecast raised new concerns for HTC as it looks to regain its momentum.

HTC said the disappointing forecast stemmed from its transition to newer products, which will be previewed at the Mobile World Congress. It called the slow down “temporary.”

“Our weakness in first-quarter guidance also comes from facing competition in the U.S. from iPhone and Samsung,” said Chief Financial Officer Winston Yung said on a conference call. “LTE handsets also didn’t meet our expectations.”

HTC did not provide unit shipments for the fourth quarter — the first time it hasn’t done so — and declined to forecast unit sales for the first quarter. But it hopes to see improving sales as it applies more focus to its line-up. The company has been talking about putting out fewer phones and rallying around more “hero” devices.

“While short term performance may not meet the results as expected, we have gained further experience and advancement in the areas of brand management and product innovation,” CEO Peter Chou said in a statement. “These fundamental strengths and the groundwork we have laid will take us into 2012 with a renewed focus and determination.”

The company rode the wave behind Android and enjoyed a lot of growth along with the rest of the smartphone market. But as Samsung began cranking on Android phones, Apple exploded last quarter with an impressive showing on iPhone sales and low-end Chinese makers ZTE and Huawei came on strong, it has left HTC with less room to stand out.

Now, the company faces an uphill battle as it looks to remain relevant as a top Android manufacturer without some of the vertical advantages enjoyed by Samsung. Om has been talking about this for a while and has laid out the challenge for HTC and other Android makers in a market that is increasingly tough to compete in with Samsung commanding the top end and Chinese manufacturers moving up from the bottom.

HTC will hope that the HTC Ville, a 4.3-inch inch Android 4.0 device, and other upcoming devices can help lead a turnaround. But it’s unclear what will provide the real spark. The HTC Rezound was one of the top Android devices this fall from HTC but it got overshadowed by the Galaxy Nexus from Samsung and the Motorola Razr . Does HTC still have gas in the tank? It could still compete but with Samsung the lead dog on Android and Nokia the likely standard-bearer on Windows Phone, this transition period could take a while.

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