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The rise of the other phone makers, jury's back in the DRM case, and there's

luxury. Then there's luxury. It's Wednesday, December 17, 2014. I'm Ken Ray and this is news from MacoS. Ken.

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As the fourth quarter of calendar year 2014 draws to a close, Gartner is out with smartphone sales numbers

for the third quarter of calendar year 2014.

So timely, so topical. While there were considerable moves tracked by

Samsung Apple and Shao Me, Fortune says the real area to watch is actual areas

developing markets are going to smartphones in droves according

to Gartner quoting the fortune piece with the price differential between dumb phones and

smart rapidly shrinking, whole populations

seem to be trading up. Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa recorded their highest

growth ever in Q3, according to Gartner, with sales of smartphones growing almost 50% year over year.

As for which smartphone manufacturers are winning in those regions, who can say the others category saw the biggest growth in the

third quarter growing from a 44.5% share in the third quarter of 2013 to a 47.5% share last quarter. Of the three hottest names in phones,

Gartner wrote of Samsung, sales of Samsung's feature phones and smartphones declined in the third quarter of 2014 and

Samsung lost market share in both markets. Samsung's deepest decline came

from feature phones which decreased by 10.8% year over year.

The man for Samsung's smartphones weakened mostly in Western Europe and Asia.

Samsung's smartphone sales decline 28.6% in China, the biggest market for Samsung.

Of Apple, Gartner wrote, sales of iPhones grew 26% in the third quarter of 2014.

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