Apple's share of tablet shipments fell from 66% in Q2 2012 to 50% in Q3 2012

"Worldwide tablet shipments totaled 27.8 million units in the third quarter of 2012 (3Q12), according to preliminary data from the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Tablet Tracker. The tablet market grew 49.5% year over year in 3Q12 and 6.7% over the second quarter of 2012. Android shipments, led by Samsung and Amazon, surged during the quarter, at the expense of Apple, which saw its share slip notably during the quarter.
“Samsung took advantage of an opportunity in the second quarter”
"After a very strong second quarter, Apple saw growth slow as both consumer and commercial (including education) shipments declined, and rumors of a forthcoming iPad mini began to heat up," said Tom Mainelli, research director, Tablets at IDC. "We believe a sizeable percentage of consumers interested in buying an Apple tablet sat out the third quarter in anticipation of an announcement about the new iPad mini. Now that the new mini, and a fourth-generation full-sized iPad, are both shipping we expect Apple to have a very good quarter. However, we believe the mini's relatively high $329 starting price leaves plenty of room for Android vendors to build upon the success they achieved in the third quarter."
Apple's slowdown put a sizeable dent in the company's commanding worldwide market tablet share, which slipped from 65.5% in 2Q12 to 50.4% in 3Q12. The remaining top five tablet vendors all gained share during the quarter as a result. Most notable was the impressive quarter turned out by Samsung—driven by its Galaxy Tab and Note 10.1. Samsung shipped 5.1 million tablets worldwide in 3Q12, up 115.0% from 2Q12; that's an increase of 325.0% from 3Q11, when it shipped 1.2 million tablets."

Source:  Press release from IDC, 5th November 2012

Internet data usage is up 120% Y-o-Y in H2 2012 the US

"Internet data usage is up by 120% in North America
Netflix continues to dominate North American fixed networks with 33% of bandwidth share
Asia is the world leader of mobile data consumption with monthly usage of 659 MB, up by 10% in the last 6 months
YouTube represents more than 20% of peak period downstream traffic on mobile networks in Europe"

Source:  Data from Sandvine, November 2012

Barack Obama's 2012 Election celebration picture is the most Liked picture ever on Facebook

"Shortly after President Obama won re-election last night, a simple photo of the president embracing his wife was posted on his Facebook page. Just a few hours later, and with apologies to Gangnam Style, Justin Bieber, and adorable kittens worldwide, that shot became the most "liked" photo ever on Facebook.
At the moment, it's been liked over 3.1 million times, and the number is still climbing.
The same photo was also posted to the president's Twitter account last night, and quickly smashed Twitter records for the most retweets. At the moment it's been retweeted more than 638,000 times. The next most popular tweet from Justin Bieber has under 225,000.
Over on the GOP side of Facebook, where Mitt Romney's page has about a third the "likes" of Obama's, a few simple posts with a shot of the candidate and the words "Thank You" have garnered just under a million digital thumbs-up so far. Understandably, Republican voters seem to have been in less of a liking mood last night."

Source:  Cnet, 7th November 2012

The 2012 US Election Night on Twitter

"One hundred million votes and 31 million Tweets later, Election Day 2012 has come to a close. As the results of the election were called by news organizations, the conversation on Twitter surged, hitting a peak of 327,452 Tweets per minute (TPM). Before President Obama took the stage to address the nation, he shared a special update on Twitter. As thousands of supporters cheered in Chicago, more than 455,000 (and counting) retweeted his celebratory message:

Four more years. twitter.com/BarackObama/st…
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) November 7, 2012

While the announcement of results was the biggest moment of the election cycle, there were many other notable Twitter moments tonight:
-327,452 TPM - 11:19pm ET - Networks call Obama's reelection
-85,273 TPM -11:12pm ET - IA presidential race called
-69,031 TPM - 9:33pm ET - PA and WI presidential races called
-65,106 TPM - 8:03pm ET - Polls close in various states; AP calls races for IL, CT, ME, DC, DE, RI, MD, MA"
Source:  Twitter blog, 6th November 2012
Also - 3.1m Likes and 360,000 shares on Facebook

Starbucks processes more than 2 million mobile payments each week

"Starbucks continues to expand its role as a leading mobile payments provider as evidenced in comments made last week by a company executive who said more than 2 million mobile payment transactions occur every week.
The comments were made by Howard Schultz, president/CEO of Starbucks, during a conference call with analysts to discuss the company’s fourth quarter results. Mr. Schultz also said that the burden is on companies to recognize the seismic change in consumer behavior as a result of the emergence of mobile commerce and mobile payments as well as social and digital media."

Source:  Mobile Commerce Daily, 5th November 2012

Note - I think that these must all be in the US

Earlier - 26m in less than a year announced in Dec 2011

Apple sold 3 million iPad 4 & iPad minis in the first 3 days

"Apple® today announced it has sold three million iPads in just three days since the launch of its new iPad® mini and fourth generation iPad—double the previous first weekend milestone of 1.5 million Wi-Fi only models sold for the third generation iPad in March. The Wi-Fi + Cellular versions of both iPad mini and fourth generation iPad will ship in a few weeks in the US and in many more countries later this year.
[...]
Both iPad mini and the new fourth generation iPad with Retina display are available in 34 countries including the US, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea and the UK, and will be available in many more countries later this year, including mainland China. Demand for iPad mini exceeded the initial supply and while many of the pre-orders have been shipped to customers, some are scheduled to be shipped later this month."
Source:  Press release from Apple, 5th November 2012
Note - it's interesting that they're not breaking down the figures between the two very different models

There is a strong correlation between engagement & organic reach on Facebook; weak between frequency of posting & reach

"We pulled 4 months worth of data for a client that we have worked consistently with and whose content and campaign focus has changed little over the 4 months thereby minimising the variables. From this data we aggregated the daily organic reach of the page up to the weekly level and subtracted daily likes away from the daily PTAT number. This last step was to ensure that the people talking about this figure was from likes of content, shares and comments rather than likes of the page which do not relate to page posts.
These data sets were then compared to one another to find the correlation coefficient between organic reach & engagements and organic reach & frequency of posting.
Results:
We find that there was a strong correlation between engagements & organic reach (0.86)
There was a weak correlation between frequency & organic reach (0.22)
We also found a negative correlation between posting frequency and engagements (-0.011)"

Source:  Blog post by iProspect UK, 24th October 2012

54 of the world's top 100 companies use Instagram

"With over 100 million users, more brands are recognizing the powerful reach and potential of Instagram. 54% of the world’s top brands using the mobile network to engage consumers. In our quarterly study, we take a look at who’s doing it, how they’re doing it, and who’s doing it the best.
When we first studied Instagram adoption in August, brands were starting to engage on the network. Three months later, the brands who adopted early are seeing month-over-month growth, creating a bigger gap between themselves and brands who haven’t started using the service."

Source:  Research by Simply Measured, 31st October 2012

53 Percent of Visitors to Enthusiast Communities Make Purchase Decisions Based on Research on these Sites

"Huddler, a digital media company that powers millions of daily interactions on the world's most influential enthusiast communities, today released new research into the impact of enthusiast communities on consumer purchasing behavior for both community participants and the casual internet searcher. Huddler surveyed more than 25,000 members who participate in the 31 communities it powers, such AVSForum.com, Mothering.com, StyleForum.net and MakeupTalk.com. According to Huddler data, more than 53 percent of visitors to enthusiast communities directly attribute their purchase choices to research conducted on these sites."

Source:  Press release from Huddler, 31st October 2012

HootSuite has 5 million users

"On October 12, 2012, HootSuite reached 5 million users.
[...]
What does five million look like? At five million users, we span the globe. Our expansion into Europe, Asia and Latin America is driving our growth, and there’s a good chance we speak your language. How fast are we growing? The first million took nearly two years, and the fifth million took just five months.
We are proudest of our international growth and global reach, which has been sparked by listening to users on the ground and responding to their requests. In doing so, HootSuite Community has hosted over a 100 HootUps, assigned regional Diplomats, translated our tools into 20 languages and offered regional apps. Our tools are in use on screens in such diverse locales as Irkutsk in Siberia, San Francisco advertising agencies, London multinational brands, Egypt during their revolution and over on the tiny islands of Palau."

Source:  Blog post by HootSuite, 1st November 2012

There are approximately 700,000 apps on the Android the iOS app stores

"Google Inc said there are about 700,000 applications available for downloading onto mobile devices that run the Android operating system, challenging Apple Inc’s lead in the race for software tools.
That means Google has matched Apple in the number of games, productivity tools and other programs that are usable on handheld electronics, including tablets and smartphones. Apple said last week that its App Store has more than 700,000 apps."

Source:  Businessweek, 29th October 2012

Indian classified ads site Quikr has 17 million monthly visitors

"Quikr is India’s largest horizontal classifieds platform with 17 million unique individuals and small businesses using it across 83 cities every month. These individuals and businesses access Quikr to sell, buy, rent or find products and services in a variety of categories such as electronics, cars, bikes, real estate, services, jobs, education and entertainment. Existing investors include Nokia Growth Partners and Omidyar Network, apart from those mentioned above."

Source:  Press release from Quikr, 22nd May 2012