Hey, turns out that people seem to like a little thing called the iPhone 3G. Apple just announced that its sold 6.9 million of em during its financial fourth quarter, beating out the 6.1 million total first-gen iPhones sold in the previous five quarters -- and beating RIMs total sales this quarter, which Apple seems excited about. Of course, that represents worldwide availability in 51 countries vs the initial US-only launch, so its not totally unexpected that the numbers are up, but it means that Apples hit its goal of 10 million iPhones sold in 2008, which should cause some celebration in Cupertino. Apple also seems pleased with Mac sales, which are up 21 percent over a year ago to 2.6 million -- more than its sold in any other quarter ever. All that combines with 11 million iPods sold for a total profit of $1.1 billion on revenues of $7.9 billion -- thats a lot of scratch. Still, times are tough, so Steve, do you have a seemingly-cautious statement about the US economy that also doubles as a smug shot at your competitors? "We dont yet know how this economic downturn will affect Apple. But were armed with the strongest product line in our history, the most talented employees and the best customers in our industry. And $25 billion of cash safely in the bank with zero debt." Yeah, we thought you might.PS.- The analyst call just finished with a special appearance from Steve Jobs, who took questions. Head past the break for our semi-liveblog transcript of the good parts.
Update: Steves on the call. He says that Apple has 5,500 apps in the iPhone App Store, and that Apple should sell its 200 millionth app tomorrow -- "unlike anything weve seen in our careers." Hes calling Apple customers the "smartest, more product-aware customers in the market," and that economic hardships wont cause them to switch to cheaper machines, just delay their purchases, since "none of our competitors can deliver products in this class." In addition, Apple plans to invest and "innovate through the downturn" as it did the last time the economy went sour.
Update 2: Taking questions now -- Steve says that the iPhone could be considered an entrant into the netbook market, since it can browse the web (uh, sure), but that Apples looking at the "nascent" netbook market and its "got some interesting ideas there if it does evolve."
Update 3: Hitting harder on the price aspect of netbooks, Steve says, "We dont know how to make a $500 machine thats not a piece of junk, and our DNA wont let us do it." He also says that he thinks Apple TV will remain a "hobby" in 2009, and totally shot down a question about touch / tablet computing.
Update 4: Thats it! In response to a question about different form factors for the iPhone, Steve said "Babe Ruth only had one home run, but he hit it a bunch of times," and that he didnt think software developers would want to target lots of different platforms -- probably indicating that the current iPhone design isnt changing for a while. He also said that he didnt think Apples competitors really understood the idea of a phone as a "software platform" -- a pill that requires a pretty big dose of RDF to swallow, since both Google and Microsoft probably beg to differ.
