That's fine, but a company cant just rely on the pie getting bigger, I mean the growth of tablets and smartphones will be happening for a while, but if Apple can it would be good to increase their percentage within that market.  Otherwise, it doesn't impress much.

Yes I meant Windows 8. When I said MS I meant OS (Windows 8 and whatever the Niche tablets use from Q3), not manufacturer.

I really don't know why I am trying to argue with you, but:

1. Apple's stock price is due to rumors for slower sales of the iPhone 5 and not showing any new innovation that could really capture / create a huge market.

2. Andorid pushing users towards Google Search? That is just stupid. How many of the Android users (no matter if smartphone or tablet or both) have used Google Search before? A very conservative estimation would be 100%. Who the hell needed to be pushed towards a Google Search? Basically everyone on this planet who has access to it used it. Especially the ones using smartphones.

3. Wasn't there an article about MS making more money on Android than Google? *edit* Well, it is probably very close.
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/worlds-most-profitable-android-company-microsoft/9651

You are completly right to do not appreciate my suggestion about the ban as it was effectively the intend :)
Sorry but this sarcastic title looks like an open invitation to flamewar to me.

This article about Microsoft's patent is very interresting.

Here you can see that Microsoft is actually way ahead in term of patent (Computer Software) and the pipeline is very strong :
http://spectrum.ieee.org/static/interactive-patent-power-2012

This is actually starting to really pay of for them.

Microsoft Surface advertising budget estimated to be between $1-$1.5 billion. I sure hope those 1 million surface tablets profits exceed even 10% of that...

You don't go all out for 1 million tablets. These sales are atrocious. I stand by 5% market share.

No...Windows 8/RT as a whole (PC's, tablets, phones, etc.) had an advertising budget of $1-1.5bn...not just the Surface lol. Anyway, MS spend over $1bn per quarter on advertising normally, so this is no big deal

My mistake, thank you for the clarification. Forbes $1.5-$1.8 billion. Here

Financials on the 24th did someone say?

Yeah, here's the official vgchartz thread about it: http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread.php?id=153035

No they did not. MS yearly advertising budget is 1.6 - 1.9 billion USD for the whole company. It used to be in this range at least.

"How does that compare to, say, Microsoft (MSFT)? Advertising in Redmond was $1.6 billion in fiscal 2012 (its year ends in June), $1.9 billion in 2011, and $1.6 billion in 2010."

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ycharts/2012/08/02/who-spends-more-on-ads-apple-or-microsoft-another-lesson-in-quality-vs-quantity/

Even with all the new releases this year, I doubt it will exceed 2.5 billion USD. This is like the 500 million ad campaign for Kinect and the 500 million Windows phone campaign that never happened. Everbody just accepted this number without any doubt. When the earnings releases came out, it said the EDD had spend 380 million USD or something in that range for advertisement for the holiday quarter, slightly up from previous year.

I really think the marketing budget for Windows 8 will be much smaller than a lot of people would guess.