> This is actual phone handset market being delivered (not necessarily sold, as many of them are subsidized to $0).

Sold is sold, subsidies just change who is doing the buying.

Alternatively, subsidies don't change who is doing the buying, but rather obscure the buying behind a built in camouflaged payment plan.

I honestly don't see how you get cheerleadery out of "Android now powers 75% of all smartphones sold". That is about as factual as it gets.

Because it's not true?

Android is the OS loaded on 75% of the phones shipped in Q3. Not sold.

For instance: iPhone5 was not shipped for the vast majority of people who purchased it when released in Q3, even though they purchased it in Q3.

This is lying with stats. It's annoying as hell.

The title makes a clear statement, and the article itself questions whether a Google dominated smartphone landscape is a good thing.

I'm not seeing the "cheerleadery" side of this.

The title says sales, the data says shipped. The title says "smartphones" the actual software platforms (aka Android vs iOS vs whatever else) are mobile devices, not phones.

The first part alone really screws up the numbers, as tons of iPhone5s were sold, but not shipped, in Q3.

The article assume smartphone makers will continue to battle on hardware for tiny margin and let Google handles the software.

That is possible, as we see with Amazon, that they focus on their software ecosystem and keep Google largely out of the picture. That is not as unlikely as it seems, the Nexus line and Amazon have broken the taboo against cheap quality hardware and that is like a red carpet for the cheap chinese makers. Hopefully the current manufacturers will want to avoid a second serving of the Windows OEM market, so they may decide to focus on their software ecosystem instead.

That is the best scenario, one where Microsoft and RIM both will have a chance to bring diversity. The market is too young to settle on a single OS.