Motorola Milestone sells out in less than 3 hours

Comments

• If they only got 10 units, then selling out in 2.5 hours is not really spectacular. Give us some real numbers to see how well it is doing. Posted by adrianaitken, United Kingdom
• Really...how many did they even have in-stock....come on!
  
  Maybe 15 units to sell.....plus once everyone touches them....it is a Motorola...they will be returning those devices anyway...if not for defective, then just because they are not good devices.. Posted by Mike, US
• Sorry Mike. OS was built by Google. I think they have a pretty good track record for software development. Most hardware components especially the CPU are shared by the iPhone. Posted by magnusdopus, US
• I'm not sure what Mike is basing his opinion on. In the United States it was estimated that about 700,000 - 800,000 Droids (the US counterpart to the Milestone) were sold in the first three weeks. I haven't seen any reports of large numbers of returns, and most reviews have been pretty positive.
  
  I find my Droid very solid and think it was built pretty well. I'm happy with my purchase.
  Posted by anotherguy, United States
• Droid sales have never been published by Verizon. Anyone can make an estimate but that has nothing to do with how well nor not well the Droid is doing in the market. On the other hand, as the highest profile handset of the largest wireless provider in the US, I would guess that by default it has to do reasonably well for at least until the end of the year. Posted by jamessmoke, USA
• anotherguy - 800k droids? Where the hell did you get that idea?
  
  I would think if Motorola sold that many droids they would be over a million by now. Since motorola hasn't released any sales numbers for droids we have to assume they are embarrassed to release results.
  
  Posted by Riley, Canada
• I didn't think the iPhone would be ripped from the top so easily by an obviously superior device. Good for Motorola. Posted by John, USA
• 
  I was expecting to have regrets after buying the Droid...but it has been phone nirvana for me. I'd recommend it to anyone wanting mobile email and internet. Posted by Hank, USA
• C'mon guys... if you control the data, you can tell the public whatever you want! 800K phones or just 8 phones? Nobody, and I mean nobody... but the guy who collects the sales data truly knows what was pushed. Personally I hate the hyped up "we have XXX in stock, come get 'em now!" pitches. Ever since I stumbled upon a little website that does the work for me, I don't wait for stock to replenish by hitting the refresh button furiously. I just use www.azgizmo.com and let it run until I hear the foghorn. By the time I open my browser, this thing has the purchase screen pulled up and I'm first in line to get it. Feverishly fast and FREE! Happy hunting! Posted by OutofStock, USofA
• @Riley,
  
  You're right that no numbers have been released publicly by either Verizon or Motorola. However there have been a few analytic firms tracking either store sales or internet traffic.
  
  Initial estimates were about 100k units sold the first weekend, 250k the first week, and about 700-800k in about 3 weeks (the last figure from RBC Capital analyst Mark Sue). The first week's figure was quoted by the analytics firm Flurry.
  
  Some articles quoting these figures (beginning with the initial sales figures):
  
  http://topnews.us/content/28396-flurry-motorola-droid-s-debut-week-sales-stood-250000
  
  http://www.csmonitor.com/Innovation/Horizons/2009/1116/verizon-droid-makes-a-strong-first-week-showing
  
  http://www.infosyncworld.com/news/n/10686.html
  
  http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2009/11/30/motorola-droid-closes-in-on-its-one-million-sold-target/
  
  Again, you're correct that no hard sales figures have been reported but these seem like reasonable estimates (all figures are just for the United States).
  
  
  
  Posted by anotherguy, United States
• It's quite funny to see all these negative posts from weeping and insecure iFone users.
  If the the droid is proving to be successful why loose sleep over it?
  
  
  "Wanna stop jelaous iFone users loosing countless hours of sleep? There's an app for that"
  
  (if only!!) Posted by JimB, UK
• Not surprising it sold out so fast, it's what everyone's been dreaming of for years now.
  
  Motorola to get off their backsides and re-join the phone race and they've certainly done it in style.
  
  I started with a Motorola A920 which apart from being a brick and severely locked down by 3 was actually an amazing phone, probably one of the first with built in GPS (had 3 not locked that out!). I then went to the A1000 which was virtually an iPhone without iTunes and Apple's monopolistic approach. It was an absolutely dream phone until I lost it :(
  
  After that I then got a Motorola V3XX because I thought Motorola phones were really good, I was a bit late joining the V3 revolution, as I'd heard about a lot of problems with the early V3's, however the V3XX was perfect. A very nice and stylish, well thought out device.
  
  When I decided the V3 was getting a bit old and I wanted a better camera on the phone I waited for Motorola to produce something more exciting, like bringing one of the next A series phones to the UK (like the A1200), but unfortunately Motorola didn't sell these to the UK, only to Asia, even spoiling the A series by removing 3G compatibility from the A1600 (MotoMing) to sell in China (as to why a third world country would want such a technologically advanced phone with no 3G service is absolutely beyond me! The only thing that would have stopped me buying one had it been launched in the UK would have been the name is Ming or Mingin' is slang for something dirty or digusting)
  
  Eventually I got fed up of waiting for Motorola to get off their backsides and release a decent phone - I was after one with decent OS (Symbian/Windows or Android), GPS, at least a 3mp camera, and a mini-usb charging slot (for convenience of charging, I never like the other phone makes for that as most charge of special slots, and that means that if your away somewhere (I do alot of scout camps) and you want to charge the phone from a nearby computer you have to run round trying to find someone with a USB to special phone manufacturers connector, where as with mini-usb the amount of devices (camera's, satnavs, mp3 players, etc) that feature mini-usb you can usually find a mini-usb cable lying around anywhere!).
  
  I eventually give up on Motorola and went to 3Skypephone, even though it's only a cheap basic phone and doesn't have a standard OS on it so is really restricted with apps, it isn't a bad phone, it has all that I wanted on it, including a camera which is far higher res than most other phones (3.2mp) and more importantly a mini-usb charging port. Now though Moto is back in the running I might take a look at the new Motorola. Posted by Darren, UK
• I use an iPhone, Even with the Milestone (aka Droid), the iPhone stays up top. Even though there are some phones that do "more", no one really know's why the iPhone stays up top.
  
  I think the name helps, but also the 110,000 apps help too. I think also because the iPhone is super easy to use. You just click what you want. And funnily enough you get it. No Hiccups.
  
  As they say there is no published information by Verizon or Motorola. Just estimates.
  
  Android is a BRILLIANT OS, much better then Windows Mobile (Microsoft you failed here), but there's 1 problem with Android, its open source and freely avaliable for anyone to put on their mobiles. Which means making apps etc for it hard, because your app could work on one android device, but not the other because of hardware issues etc, which means you have to export it multiple times. You don't get this on the iPhone, export it once and make it work across 6 diff models (iPhone, iPhone 3G, iPhone3GS , iPod Touch 1G, iPod Touch 2G, iPod Touch 3G) no pains.
  
  This is why many people don't develop apps for android.
  
  The iPhone can be used by anyone (Including the blind) which makes it super awesome. The iPhone is just universal, and easy to use and make for.
  
  You've seen after the iPhone was on sale many other manufacturers started making "similar phones", thats because Apple are TREND makers, they make new things out of the box, and people copy them, mainly for the $$ Posted by Daniel, England
• I really don't know why people want to be so confident that the iPhone will always be on top.
  
  Thats the last thing ANYONE should want.
  
  I have an iPhone, I like it, I don't love it but it does everything I want it to, but I do wish it would do more.
  
  The more competition that comes out and WHEN not IF someone releases a phone that does it better than the iPhone will be good for everyone and thats what every iPhone owner should want to happen. That will mean that Apple have to take notice of things that people want rather than what we think they should have.
  
  For me, I really hope Android in general gets some amazing handsets that make a lot of people consider leaving the iPhone, only that way will Apple have to do things better again. Posted by John Howells, Wales
• @John Howells, very well said
  
  @Daniel, Just another ignorant iPhone user comment that probably reads to much appleinsider with their FUD and didn't look into the matter himself. I'm an ex iPhone user, currently using a HTC Hero (Android 1.5) and awaiting the delivery of my Milestone.
  Let me just rectify a couple of things you say:
  
  - "After the iPhone other manuf. started to produce simular phones"
  
  BS Long before the iPhone was announced (jan 2007) the trend already was moving to bigger screens, touch screens, icons, phones with a real OS. Just a new examples in Real multitasking OS; 2002 Nokia 7650. Large touchscreen in 2004 the O2 XDA-II ( http://www.gsmarena.com/o2_xda_iis-933.php ) , 2006 the Eten G500+ ( http://www.gsmarena.com/eten_g500+-1655.php ), and Jan 2007, just before the iPhone the LG Prada ( http://www.gsmarena.com/lg_ke850_prada-1828.php ) the last really doesn't like much different than the iPhone.
  
  - "It's more difficult to develop for Android than for iPhone"
  
  BS. You can only develop for iPhone on a Mac, You can write Apps for Android on PC,Mac and Linux, you don't have to write/export apps multiple times.You just have specify the minimum OS version required to run your app and it will run on that and higher versions of the OS. There are apps that don't work on all Android phones but that's equally true for the iPhone. (Ever tried a app that uses bluetooth on a first generation iPod touch??)
  True you have to take into account different hardware capabilities like for example screen resolutions but that's only a good thing. What do you think what will happen with those 110.000 (mostly duplicate) apps when the next iPhone has a higher screen resolution? or do you think that the iPhone will always be locked to the 2007 tech standard it currently has?
  
  Why there were not many developers for android? Simply because the installed userbase was too small, you can already see that with the userbase expanding the number of devs is exploding. (the beginning of november there were about 12000 android apps, now dec 12th there are more than 20000 apps) Posted by Stefan, Spain
• Apple is getting is facing a difficult time; After the introduction of the amazing iPhone in 2007 it hardly evolved. What did they manage in almost three years, a 50% speedup and double the amount of Flash. Now look at Android. Three months ago the fastest Android had the same processor power as the original iPhone and the same screen resolution, the milestone has about the same CPU power as the 3GS and almost quadruples the number of screen pixels, the Acer liquid 1 runs at 768Mhz and in January the SE X10 comes with a 4" screen and a 1Ghz snapdragon processor.
  If Apple continues to improve at snail pace and Android like what they are showing now the difference next year will be like a Pentium II vs an Core i7. Posted by Robin Jacobs, Netherlands
• ON FT ON COMMENT
  Posted by Lee HIBBERT, UK
• @JimB... funny!
  
  iWhine comments are fun to read... lol! Posted by Rob, US