I don't know anything about the analyst referenced in the article, but there are two factors contributing to these types of prediction errors.

1. Most analysts don't have prior industry experience in their field before becoming an analyst. Although they (usually) pick up enough as they go along to understand the terms and major issues, they have little depth and are unable to reason from first principles. I work for one of these large analyst firms and my estimate is that less than 10% of our analysts have relevant industry experience. We are not unexeptional in this.

2. Vendors invest heavily in analyst relations. While this helps to better inform the analysts, it also pushes the vendor's world view. Invites to conferences and events, access to senior execs, early access to information, etc. also help reinforce the bond between the vendor and the analyst. So, not only are analysts biased towards that which they know best, it is also harder to write something negative about a company/product where you personally know the people involved.

I'd actually argue that the quote above is substantively correct (in the US).

2006: Phones are sold largely on contract, by various retailers, including the manufacturer; churn is driven largely on pricing, network performance, and network-effect factors.

2014: Phones are sold largely on contract, by various retailers, including the manufacturer; churn is driven largely on pricing, network performance, and network-effect factors.

The iPhone changed the experience of using the mobile phone, and what we did on our mobile phones - not how we buy them, nor did the change the base reason people switch carriers - not in the long game anyhow, people still switch because of dissatisfaction with their existing provider, or that the grass appears greener on the other side.

We went from being nickel and dimed on minutes and SMS with unlimited data to being nickel and dimed on data with unlimited minutes and SMS.

That is how the iPhone changed the market for the better at least in the UK and even if you don't have one. Competitive pressure may have caused it to happen eventually but we can all thank Steve Jobs for speeding up that important change.

And for manufactures it opened the way for software to overtake hardware as defining feature of a phone, a massive structural shift in the industry IMO.

Feature phones are Dead. Traditional Phone Manufactures are on life support. Blackberry is dead, Nokia is losing their shirt, they are losing money. Samsung and Apple together are taking 103% of the profits in the industry. Hey, that doesn't add up? Well, because the competitors are at -3%.

The app ecosystem has paid out $15B+ in revenue to developers. This is a fundamental market shift for phone application developers.

These are fundamental and important shifts in the mobile industry.

I wish I could get paid to spout nonsense all day long with no repercussions on the accuracy.

http://www.forrester.com/Apple+Doubles+Down+On+Its+Premium+B...

Thanks to playing their cards right and arrogance and stupidity on part of Nokia they won, but it wasn't always clear it would be like that.

That's totally untrue. It destroyed everything of the time -- I know, I had smartphones since 2000, Sony stuff, Nokia stuff etc.

I don't understand why people like to rewrite history. At the behinning the fight wasn't at all decided.

That's pretty much the core of what I still use a smartphone for. My iPhone is sitting here next to me playing me music as it has done all day, keeping me in touch with my partner who is interstate, reminding me that I have to put the bins out tonight, and otherwise staying out of my way.

What else did a smartphone need to do that the iPhone couldn't?

PuTTY has been supported on Nokia phones since 2004: http://s2putty.sourceforge.net/news.html

I didn't use it, but I did have a Python interpreter running on my E65 (with APIs for camera, GPS, calling, etc) before the iPhone 1 was even released.

http://www.midpssh.org/

And they rightly forget them -- they were awful, over-expensive crap. $10 for some BS casual game, $30 for a TODO app etc. And don't get me started on the Java ME crap.

iPhone changed the whole carrier/manufacturer/customer dynamic for the better (this is coming from a diehard BlackBerry user).

And he's right about price. The iPhone was not cheap, and there is a market for cheap smartphones. I think what they missed is what was happening with Android as that is what stole the market he was aligning Microsoft towards.

Not once did he say it wouldn't work for Apple. He reaffirmed their vision at the time and concluded saying "lets see what happens".

What Microsoft failed to do is innovate on their own products hard enough. And sadly for Microsoft, their consumer brand is just not as cool as Apple and probably never will be.

In Europe, carrier and manufacturer were decoupled for some time before iPhone, so it was not revolutionary in that regard.

> Crytek jumps on Steam Machine hype train, announces Linux support[1]

[1]: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2014/03/crytek-jumps-on-steam-...

"Lead analyst covering all aspects of consumer mobility and the digital home. Responsible for a continuous stream of research and strategic advice to leaders at Fortune 1000 companies."