One of my favorite examples was one where you take three males named Bob. All three are 30 years old, 5-ft 6-in tall, weighing 220 pounds. In this group what is the percentage of gentlemen that are named Bob? The answer can be anything from 0 to 100%. It depends on the definition of “gentleman” and, of course other criteria that I never mentioned in the raw data. It is this type of logic that was used in a recent “analysis” (we will call it that for lack of a better word) where a group named Canalys claimed that Apple is leading the “PC” market with Lenovo running in 2nd place. This study shows Apple as having a 17.1% market share in the “PC” world compared to Lenovo’s 12.9%. That is a nice lead when you think about it. But how did Apple go from being in the “other” grouping to leading in two quarters? Well remember that comment we made about defining number to make them mean what you want? Well that is what happened here. Due to the rise in x86 based tablets many analysts have decided that tablets are PCs. They have lumped ALL tablets (ARM, x86 and other) into the lump group “PC”. That means that Apple’s numbers are inflated by iPad sales.

The fact that ARM based tablets are not actually PCs has missed many at Canalys. PC makers want x86 tablets that are capable of running all PC software included in sales and shipping numbers, but not ARM based devices (which are still purely mobile products). Still the improperly defined data could lead consumers or investors to make incorrect assumptions about Apple’s place in the PC market and shows how a single analyst with a goal can use numbers to push their agenda.

But that is not all we have for you today. We also have a staggering number (pun intended) of headlines showing that Widows phone jumped 77% in units Shipped! That is an amazing number right? Well it is, but when you consider the actual market share involved here it becomes much less staggering. In 2012 roughly 4.9 Million Windows Phone devices shipped to stores (that is not actual sales, but units shipped) in 2013 they shipped 8.7 Million devices. The jump is a little less than 4 million year over year for Q2. That number is miniscule compared to iOS and Android who shipped 31.2 and 187.4 million respectively. Still that 77% increase sounds like a big number, until you tie it in with reality… It is also worth mentioning that Android had a 73.5% increase in units shipped which is a big number in terms of percentage and actual volume. In Q2 2013 79.4 Million more Android phones shipped than in Q2 2012 that growth number is more than twice what iOS did on its own (31.2 Million for Q2 2013).

Well that about wraps up today’s fun with numbers, you can leave your comments in our Forum