Oh, no, the Sun told us yesterday, the iPhone is a disaster, and Apple is in trouble! But then the company released third-quarter earnings, and, well: Oh, yes, the Journal tells us today, Apple's earnings are a massive 73 percent, and the iPhone had little to nothing to do with it! Um, huh? Well, while Apple has made the gizmo of the moment its face of the moment, the truth is that it continues to rack up incredible revenues on good old Macs ($2.3 billion in sales, up from last year's $1.87 billion) and iPods ($1.57 billion). Even better, the phone, which is also an iPod, isn't even eating into the iPod sales. (The new data also defangs AT&T's report of 146,000 iPhone activations between June 29 and July 1: Apple says it's sold 270,000 units over that period.) In short, while bloggers were griping about the fallibility of the Jesus Phone, Jobs sold 'em two Powerbooks, four Shuffles, and a Nano. And the best fringe benefit of the iPhone hype? Nobody is noticing the total floperoo that is AppleTV.

Apple's Old Standbys, iPods and Macs, Drive Profit [WSJ]
Earlier: Is the iPhone a Failure? Maybe!