Most people don't care about smartphones or feature phones, they only care about what is hot and what is not. Apple, RIM and Android are hot, Nokia and their phones are not.

On my daily commute I see more iPhones and Blackberries than I see any other phone of a similar class - the next most common phones I see are low-end basic models. Rarely do I see a Nokia N-series phone.

People that would have been happy with a basic model phone a couple of years ago now carry iPhones - 5 of my friends fall into this category, none of them ever gave a sh1t about their mobile phone a couple of years ago but now all have iPhones. 2 years ago on my daily commute it was mostly basic model phones alongside corporate Blackberries - people even buy their own Blackberries now.

Mobile web usage is growing faster than ever (30% increase in Q3 and Q4 of 2008 compared with Q1/Q2 2008) and that has everything to do with the growing interest in North American devices (smartphones, feature phones or whatever we call them!)

The North American devices have grabbed the attention of the worldwide mobile phone using public in a way that European (ie. mostly Nokia and Symbian based) phones abjectly failed to do.