Weather HTC's phone of last year was the best phone of the year or not is a matter of individual and public opinion, and certainly every individual is privvy to their personal opinion. Also, I don't think that the industry laughed at Samsung for their phone of last year either. All you have to do is look at the total number of sales not necessarily the sales in relation to other phone sales but just the sheer volume of sales to realize that Samsung may not have hit let's say a bases-loaded home run but there's no question they drove runs in.
Every individual phone has their target market and some phones hit their target market better than others. There are always surprises as well where a phone may not have been expected to do well in a particular market but instead shatters all expectations. I think the Moto X was an example of that in the past and it seems to continue along that legacy.
What I'm trying to say here in a nutshell is that all these phone companies are trying to be the best at what they can be, but some focus more on what they're best at than others and some focus more on trying to be better at other things than they are already. It's those that are forward thinking and innovative that tend to drive this market in the direction of better more advanced phones and lower costs. I think Samsung and HTC and LG and Sony and Motorola, and the list goes on and on have all in one manner or another taken great strides in the arena of innovation.
No one can dispute that Samsung has been a trend setter in the industry on so many fronts, displays, the pen, memory and now in processor manufacture. I agree that the bloat of TouchWiz is a touchy subject for many including myself, but one can't argue with the success in sheer numbers of sales.
Today when I hear advertisements about cell phones I hear generally two names mentioned, iPhone and Samsung. Often it's as though they are the only phones available. Just the other day I heard a television talk show host say "and if you have an iPhone or Samsung, this will work for you", using Samsung as a synonym for Android. It's interesting because of course although Samsung is apparently the leading manufacturer in terms of sheer numbers of sales, it is but a fraction of the total number of various Android phones out there yet is clearly recognized as being a leader in direct competition with the iPhone.
Let's just hope they all continue to be innovative and not stagnate.
