Samsung share plummets – but it’s not because of the Burning Note

Losing the halo effect

This strikes me as a bad move. Samsung's lesser phones benefitted from a "halo effect" from their top-of-the-range phones, meaning they could charge slightly more than any of the Shenzen popup brands.

The halo works both ways: a reputation for building good workhorses for the masses means an enhanced reputation for building high-end phones, just as Lexus benefits from Toyota's excellent reliability ratings.

Longer-term it can also cause staffing problems. Without a pipeline of juniors who know how to make cheap phones, you've lost a valuable talent pool for your high-end devices.

Following PC trends

Back in the day, I bought a new PC each year (sometimes more often) as the technology had moved that much in the time that it was worth the change.

For a longtime a mobile phone was the same, each year, contract is up, new phones are appealing.

These days though, each PC on the market is mas or menos the same as the one I have from last year, or even the year before - in real world usage tasks run pretty much the same on a brand new box as the old one, yeah there's some better battery life and some weight loss, but those aren't really issues for me (who's laptop spends 98% of it's time in the office and a tablet will do for the 2% I'm out), so PC sales are down the pan.

Same goes for phones, I have a galaxy note 4, yes, I could buy a new phone but what would I gain?

The OS runs perfectly quickly, the apps I use have no delay, the screen is big and beautiful enough for the odd bit of picture viewing or video watching I use and it's a fine music player so what am I going to get out of a new shiny shiny? There's nothing compelling like there used to be and it's only going to get worse.

The mobile market will follow the PC market now that the tech is "good enough" that the incremental improvements are the giant step they used to be to make a switch worth while to the majority of people (and I don't even class myself in that group, I'm a gadget nut, so should be the prime target for new shiny shiny).