It's hard to imagine Apple's App store -- 50 million users, 400,000 apps, 10 billion downloads -- being threatened with extinction, but it's not as if Tyrannosaurus Rex had a clue its demise was imminent until the process was well underway, either. We know that empires crumble: what's interesting is how.

Right now pundits are focused on the threat of Android. Apple is still shipping plenty of iPhones, but even Steve Jobs must recognize that if his were a Roman empire, the numberless device manufacturers selling Android devices are the metaphorical barbarians at the gates. Android's not the issue, however -- in fact, Android is just another lumbering dinosaur.