It’s Not Just You, Apple Inc. (AAPL)

The only constant in all this has been disappointment. Investors have been scrambling to find the platform that has been cashing in on Apple’s slide, and it’s easy to see why. The stock has shed 41% of its value since peaking the morning that the iPhone 5 hit the market late last year. However, as Samsung’s Galaxy S4 has bumped into resistance as the top anti-iPhone choice, it doesn’t seem as if anyone is truly cashing in here.

Forget the market-share slices, even though they naturally matter. The market itself appears to have badly overestimated the size of the pie itself.

The vast majority of the planet doesn’t own a smartphone, but the vast majority of the planet also can’t afford a smartphone and the costly data plan that’s necessary to stay connected. There’s a cry for cheaper hardware — and even the mighty Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has complied by keeping older models around at lower price points — but that apparently isn’t enough to make it a sound value proposition for the masses.

This will be problematic for all players. Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) and BlackBerry feel as if they still have a shot here, since there are so many people who have never owned a smartphone. Unfortunately for them, that isn’t about to change.

This will also come as rude awakening for Mozilla, which earlier this week thought it was making a splash by announcing partners for its regional launches of smartphones running a Firefox operating system. Mozilla is hoping to turn the apps-driven world on its ear with its Web-centric operating system, but will that be enough? There’s apparently resistance here in the adoption cycle, and that’s something that will require the handset makers and carriers to get even cheaper.

This isn’t good news for Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL). It’s bad news. However, the news is bad for all of the companies riding the smartphone revolution and the investors who believe that we’re still in the revolution’s infancy.

Everybody’s smart, but everybody’s smarting.

The article It’s Not Just You, Apple originally appeared on Fool.com is written by Rick Munarriz.

Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Apple and Google and owns shares of Apple, Google, and Microsoft.

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