The words fall trippingly from the tongue.

Ubuntu phone.

You crave it, like a dog craves water on a hot day. Or, really, anyone craves water on a hot day. But you happen to be down on all fours barking, so…

Ubuntu phone.

The mere promise of it is like a dream. A whisper of unspoken openness. Openness… in your pants. Your fly falls down.

Ubuntu phone.

You can finally have it all. No walled gardens, no false promises of openness, no [whatever Windows Phone is].

Ubuntu phone.

Those two words alone are enough.

But what if there was more? What if Ubuntu phone was also… a desktop? Now your breath is stolen away. How many futures can one device fulfill? How many dreams can you catch in a falling star? Just how many monkeys are in this barrel? Is it literally full of monkeys? Because that would be a lot of monkeys.

Welcome to Ubuntu Edge.

(Presumably as in “edge case”.)

What does Ubuntu Edge let you do?

…connect to any monitor and this Ubuntu phone transforms into an Ubuntu PC, with a fully integrated desktop OS and shared access to all files.

Ask yourself how much you would pay for the promise of a full Ubuntu desktop computer… in a phone? Would you give your immortal soul? No? How about $830? Because that’s the lowest tier that actually gets you a phone that is currently available on this Indiegogo project.

But price is irrelevant to you. You need this. Because like Batman stores costumes and grappling guns and possibly softcore porn all over Gotham City, you store monitors, keyboards and mice everywhere you might go. You do. That’s your strange compulsion. The doctors can’t explain it, but there it is. No matter how many times we say “Lenny, why don’t you just store your data in the cloud and then access it from different devices like a normal person?” you keep leaving peripherals in our bathroom, at Aunt Lorraine’s and one time at the Subway.

Ubuntu phone.

Because one device can do it all. Just crappily.

Ubuntu phone.

Finally, all of your weird obsessions will be rewarded.

Ubuntu phone.

Ben Bajarin:

Let’s answer the question in my title. As I continually try to make clear,

See, he was one of the good ones but “Nooooooooo”, you said…

CNet’s Lance Whitney:

Android holds the dominant market share in the U.S., but Apple’s iOS is tops at generating mobile Web traffic, according to Piper Jaffray’s Gene Munster.

Tracking data across 70 different mobile Web site, Munster’s team found that iOS’s slice of traffic rose 2.6 percent over the past four weeks, giving it a 63 percent share. Over the same time, Android’s cut rose 0.2 percent to give it a 28 percent share.

These numbers are not too far off from Net Applications most recent numbers which have iOS at 58 percent and Android at 25 percent. But let’s note a couple of caveats I think are important here. First of all, Munster’s sample of 70 web sites is a little lower than I’d like to see, particularly considering Net Applications says their sample is 40,000. This is something of a pattern with him, like when he spent all of two hours outside a (meaning one) Microsoft Store to conduct a foot traffic comparison with an Apple Store. This is why I roll my eyes any time I see his statistics quoted anywhere.

Also, let’s remember that Apple is an investment banking customer of Piper Jaffray’s.

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The Verge’s Tom Warren suggests the Surface RT is the Zune 2.0: not a terrible device, but one lacking a real compelling case.

As is so often the case, Microsoft was hobbled by its inability to make a clean break with its cash cow, Windows.

I often wonder what would have happened if Microsoft had created a Surface OS without the desktop and left Windows as its desktop OS with the Start menu that they’re now having to put back in. Windows is becoming an albatross.

But one thing we know for certain: everyone wants larger phones.

OK, I know many people do want larger phones, but this myth that’s been generated that everyone wants larger phones and Apple’s really screwing up by not shipping one now, now, NOW!!! is just wrong.

Would Apple sell more phones if they sold two sizes? Sure. And maybe they’d sell more if they sold projector phones and phones with NFC and waterproof phones and…

But they don’t do that. They focus.

Try to get over that.

Electronista:

The list of vendors opting out of Windows RT has added one more major manufacturer with news that Lenovo has dropped its IdeaPad Yoga 11.

Microsoft has also cut the price of the Surface RT to $349. I’m not sure “super cheap way to run Office that could be a dead end” is that much of a winning strategy, though.

ADDED: Yeah.

Microsoft’s results showed a $900 million loss due to Surface RT “inventory adjustments,” a charge that comes just a few days after the company officially cut Surface RT prices significantly.

Writing for CNBC, Cadie Thompson shows my Rorschach’s Cat theory in action. First she brings us one person’s view on Apple:

“Apple will every so often come out with a breakthrough product and then everybody copies it, and that’s where we are today. … It seems like everything is coming to a halt, but it’s not coming to a halt,” [former Apple interaction specialist Bruce] Tognazzini said. “And I have no doubt about that whatsoever. They will come out with another product that will change everything. I don’t think they are falling behind.”

And then she brings us another’s:

“The likelihood of Apple’s being able to come up with an innovative product or smartphone that would create new demand is very slim, given that the stock is 40 percent below its high,” [Global Equities Research managing director Chip] Chowdhry said.

One of these guys is wrong and given Tognazzini is saying pretty much exactly what I’ve written before, my money’s obviously on it being Chowdhry. What the hell the stock price being off its high has to do with Apple’s ability to make innovative products is beyond me, but Chowdhry sees what he wants to see: a dead cat of innovation.

One thing is for certain: if Chowdhry is wrong, he’ll still be gainfully employed making bad analysis about Apple.

Writing for Slate, Justin Peters has an extreme view on how to avoid distractions when blogging (via Khoi Vinh).

I Write All My Blog Posts Out Longhand, and You Should Too

…

Every time I sit down in front of my computer to write a post, I end up browsing the IMDb page for the movie Cool Runnings or the career stats for underrated outfielder Ryan Spilborghs.

Not that I’m not susceptible to the same kinds of distractions, but as someone who remembers having to write term papers out longhand and then type them, I’ll be damned if I’m going back to that.

However, I have been giving more thought to Jason Snell’s advocation of writing on the iPad, which provides fewer overt distractions than the Mac. Even though that will just feed my sick obsession with iPad keyboards. Or, possibly, because it will. Hey, I have to give into some of my demons.

Yes, I do.

BGR’s Zach Epstein in September of 2011:

“Sorry Apple, Windows 8 ushers in the post-post-PC era”

Apple paved the way but Microsoft will get there first with Windows 8. A tablet that can be as fluid and user friendly as the iPad but as capable as a Windows laptop. A tablet that can boot in under 10 seconds and fire up a full-scale version of Adobe Dreamweaver a few moments later. A tablet that can be slipped into a dock to instantly become a fully capable touch-enabled laptop computer. This is Microsoft’s vision with Windows 8, and this is what it will deliver.

BGR’s Brad Reed today:

“Current crop of Windows tablets deemed ‘simply too flawed to recommend’”

Tablets based on Microsoft’s Windows 8 and Windows RT operating systems have struggled to gain traction so far and Paul Thurrott of the Supersite for Windows says there’s a very simple explanation for this: The first generation of Windows tablets just isn’t very good. To be clear, Thurrott says that there are several touch screen Windows 8 PCs and ultrabooks that are very worthy of users’ time and that shouldn’t be overlooked. But when it comes to pure tablets, he deems that every single one is “simply too flawed to recommend” to anyone interested in buying one.

Can’t believe that pie-eyed vision didn’t work right out of the gate.