Judging by Orange’s first-day sales, the debut was quite a success. The iPhone went on sale at 7 am Tuesday and by 4 pm, Orange had sold more than 30,000. Not bad. In fact, according to Orange, it’s a new record. Said a spokesperson for the carrier: “Orange is delighted to reveal, that as of 4 PM yesterday, it…sold more than 30,000 iPhones across the UK–smashing what we believe is the previously published first-day sales record for a handset in the UK.”

Orange also claims to have registered roughly 250,000 iPhone presubscriptions, of which only a fraction have been fulfilled. If that is the case, the carrier will end up with a million iPhone users by the end of 2010.

Shares in the handset maker fell some 23 percent last week amid concerns about increased competition from Google’s (GOOG) Android operating system, which is being rolled out on a number of devices at a variety of carriers, including Palm partner Sprint (S).

This morning, analysts at Citigroup (C) cut their recommendations to sell from hold on Palm (PALM) while simultaneously raising their rating on Motorola (MOT) because of its “compelling” new Android handset, Droid.

“Motorola is launching of one of the most compelling offerings at [a] time when many investors have given up on the company’s handsets,” Citigroup analyst Jim Suva wrote in a research note.

“The revolution of product and application service offerings,” Suva added, “is going to start to crack open the enterprise door and could pose a risk for BlackBerry. Major shifts in promotion support creating a promotion commotion in the months ahead favor Motorola and post a challenge for RIMM and PALM.”

Over at CL King, analyst Lawrence Harris is similarly dubious of Palm’s prospects in the months ahead. Noting that Sprint executive David Owens said last week that the carrier plans to peddle a number of new Android devices from HTC next year, Harris sees unfavorable implications for Palm.

“Historically, Sprint has been Palm’s largest customer. Indeed, in the August quarter Sprint accounted for 85 percent of Palm’s revenues,” Harris wrote in a note to investors. “In FY09 (May) Sprint represented 43 percent of total Palm sales. Sprint has a U.S. exclusive on both the Pre and the Pixi through calendar year end. The Pixi will be launched at Sprint on November 15 for $99.99. The Pixi is fairly similar to the $149.99 Pre. Verizon has stated that it will begin offering the Pre in early CY10.”

Expounding on his analysis, Harris notes that “According to a report on Mobile Today, a U.K.-based publication, initial sales of the Pre through Telefonica’s O2 unit in the U.K. have been slow. If this report is correct, than the bulk of Palm’s sales over the next few months will probably continue to be generated through Sprint.”

That Sprint will soon add some slick new Android handsets to its lineup is worrisome, then, indeed. For Palm, it seems, driving conditions on the road to recovery are looking increasingly hazardous.

Reporting third-quarter results after market close Thursday, Google (GOOG) topped estimates, posting net income that rose to $1.64 billion, or $5.13 a share, from $1.29 billion, or $4.06 a share in the same period last year. Net revenue for the period ended in September rose nearly one percent to $4.38 billion. Excluding items, earnings for the quarter were $5.89 a share. Consensus estimates had been calling for $5.42 a share and $4.24 billion in net revenue. The chart below shows revenue sources within Google (click to enlarge).

Impressive. Seems paid clicks grew 14 percent compared to the same period last year, and four percent compared to the prior period. Cost per click was down six percent year over year, but up five percent sequentially.

“Google had a strong quarter–we saw seven percent year-over-year revenue growth despite the tough economic conditions,” said CEO Eric Schmidt. “While there is a lot of uncertainty about the pace of economic recovery, we believe the worst of the recession is behind us and now feel confident about investing heavily in our future.”

Good to hear. Google’s shares, which have already risen more than 50 percent in the past six months, are on another upward tear. They rose 1.82 percent to $539.27 on the news in after-hours trading.

Earnings call highlights via The Wall Street Journal’s Andrew LaVallee:

4:32: Call starts. The cast is the same as last quarter: Mr. Schmidt, CEO; Patrick Pichette, CFO; Jonathan Rosenberg, SVP of product management; and for the first time, Nikesh Arora, president of global sales operations and business development. But there’s a twist–they’ll be using Google’s moderator to vet questions with voters. They vote on “the most relevant questions,” which go to the Google execs, the operator says.

4:35: “While there’s obviously a lot of uncertainty about the pace of the economic recovery, we believe the worst of the recession is behind us,” Schmidt says.

He adds that Google now has the confidence to invest “heavily” in its future. “It’s all good news from our perspective, at least in looking at the quarter.”

4:37: Says “we want to really get to the perfect search engine” and that many advertisers would like to spend more with Google if the company’s product allow them to do that.

4:38: Schmidt says “we’re open for business in making strategic acquisitions, both large and small.”

4:39: It’s Pichette’s turn. “At a high level, we’re very pleased with our Q3 results,” he says. The quarter benefited from growth in AdSense for content and display initiatives.

4:41: U.S. revenue up 4% to $2.8 billion. U.K. revenue decline affected by foreign exchange as well as ongoing macroeconomic weakness, Pichette says.

4:42: Operating expenses rose from the prior quarter, mostly due to payroll, equipment and facilities-related expenses.

“We believe the worst of the recession is behind us,” he says.

4:44: Brazil was a standout in Latin America, Arora says. We’re beginning to see signs of recovery in Europe and Africa, particularly Spain. In Asia, China performed strongly as an emerging market.

4:46: Looking at the display-advertising business, those have also shown strong results, he says.

On YouTube, new advertisers and partners are helping with monetization efforts. Ninety percent of the top 50 advertisers have run YouTube campaigns with successful results–recent examples include McDonald’s and Hewlett-Packard.

4:47: YouTube has signed deals with all four major record labels and several independent labels. Earlier today, Google announced a partnership with Channel 4 in the U.K., which will bring full-length programming to the video-sharing site.

4:48: Arora adds a personal shout-out to the sales team.

4:50: Rosenberg calls the new AdWords front-end one of the company’s biggest investments of the year. Advertisers have new reports, can run more efficient campaigns and can get new features faster thanks to the platform, he says.

Rabid demand for the iPhone has emptied not just the company’s physical retail outlets, but its online store as well. “We continue to see extremely high levels of demand for the iPhone which means it comes in and out of stock very quickly and will be why the Web site hasn’t had any since Monday,” an O2 spokesperson told the Telegraph.

News of the shortage comes just days after O2 rivals Orange and Vodafone both announced plans to carry the iPhone later this year, bringing an end to O2’s exclusivity deal with Apple (AAPL). If Apple is unable to meet consumer demand with just a single U.K. carrier, how will it cope with three?

A reasonable question, but one for which Apple presumably has an answer. Said Forrester (FORR) analyst Mark Mulligan, “I don’t think [Apple] would expand if it couldn’t meet consumer demand, as that would lead to extreme consumer dissatisfaction–which compared to its peers, Apple is usually good at avoiding.”

“We estimate that the iPhone represents more than 100 percent of O2 UK’s growth, 6 percent of subscribers, 14 percent of service revenues and 13 percent of earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization,” said Bernstein analyst Robin Bienenstock. “In the UK O2 has consistently taken contract share from competitors (in particular Vodafone) since its sole distribution of this iconic brand began.”

So what will happen now that three carriers will be peddling the device? A price war, most likely. “Research shows that in every country where there is more than one operator selling it, it is cheaper,” Steven Hartley, analyst at technology research house Ovum, told The Telegraph. “It could be very disruptive, but it depends how Orange play it. If they get really aggressive O2 will have to respond and a full-on price war could start.”

A more interesting question to ponder, though, is whether the end of iPhone exclusivity abroad means the end of exclusivity in the states as well. Apple’s (AAPL) contract with AT&T (T) is set to expire as early as next year, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it won’t be renewed–much as customers dissatisfied with the carrier’s network hope it does. By ending exclusivity with AT&T, Apple could offer the iPhone through Verizon (VZ) as well, potentially more than doubling U.S. iPhone sales in the near term. But to do that, the company might have to build another version of the device, which would remove the advantage of manufacturing and supporting a single model per year.

Why? Well, the CLIQ, or DEXT as it will be confusingly branded in the U.K., incorporates Motorola’s new “MotoBlur” service, which essentially corrals Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Picasa, GMail and MS Exchange activity into a single feed and presents them on your phone.

In form, the CLIQ is a sideways slider. Like the Palm (PALM) Pre, the device boasts a full touchscreen and QWERTY keyboard. It’s got a 320 x 480-pixel, 3.1-inch HVGA screen and a five-megapixel camera. The CLIQ is video-capable (play, stream and capture) and supports the broad spectrum of media formats. It runs Android 1.5 (Cupcake), and Motorola (MOT) claims a battery life of six hours.

Jha says the phone is not intended to be a single iconic device–like, say, Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone. Rather, it is the first of a broad line of handsets, all running Android and Motoblur, that will be targeted at different customer segments around the world.

A wise strategy in the current market? Who knows? But at least it’s a step in the right direction. Motorola clearly needs to do something to right itself after the past few disastrous years. Hard to believe the company controlled 16.1 percent of the global handset market just two years ago. It’s market share today? A modest 6.5 percent. The CLIQ will be sold through T-Mobile in the United States.

The device’s spec sheet below; click to enlarge.

For Telefonica, which, through O2 and Movistar, is already the exclusive carrier of Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone in the U.K. and Spain, the deal is another coup. As Mathew Key, chairman of Telefónica Europe, noted in a gloating press release, “Telefónica is fast becoming the home of the smartphone.”

And for Palm (PALM), well, it’s another big step on the road to recovery. As CEO Jon Rubinstein said earlier this year, “We’ve been fighting the battle with basically both hands tied behind our back for the past year and half. Now we’re getting on the playing field, and we’re going to be extremely competitive. But it’s the beginning.”

RIM (RIMM) is investigating the problem and says it appears to be specific to the Japanese market. “This issue appears to be specifically limited to the BlackBerry Bold devices sold in Japan since last week and sales of BlackBerry Bold devices in other countries are unaffected by this matter,” the company said in a statement.

Another tough break for the Bold, which has suffered quite a few of them since launch. Back in January U.K. carrier Orange was said to be considering pulling the device from its lineup because of persistent problems.

Now Intel (INTC), which already held a 2.9 percent stake in Imagination, insists “it has no current intention to make an offer for Imagination Technologies.” And clearly, it would prefer Apple (AAPL) not to make one either. Why else would it raise its stake in the company less than 48 hours after news of the Mac maker’s investment?

Growth is primary, revenue is secondary.”

– Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg

Good thing Facebook is committed to growth over profits because according to the latest metrics from Hitwise Intelligence, growth is slowing. While traffic to the site in the United Kingdom did increase by 4 percent between August and September this year, growth is down from 50 percent over the same period last year. Facebook’s annual growth rate is slowing as well. The site grew 88 percent in the UK between September 2007 and 2008–a strong showing, but quite a bit weaker than the 2,905 percent growth Facebook managed in the year prior.

Could it be that Facebook, like other social networks that have gone before it, is nearing its saturation point? Is enthusiasm for the ironically named “Funwall” and the endless conga-line of “You’re A …!” widgets finally wearing off?

Java’s not worth building in. Nobody uses Java anymore. It’s this big heavyweight ball and chain.

- Apple CEO Steve Jobs, Feb. 2007

Looks like Apple (AAPL) has run afoul of Britain’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) again. The watchdog agency, which took Apple to task in 2004 for its boast that the Power Mac G5 was “the world’s fastest, most powerful personal computer,” has ruled that one of the iPhone commercials the company has been running in the U.K. is misleading. The ad, which touts the iPhone’s Web browsing abilities, included the following voiceover:

You never know which part of the Internet you’ll need. The ‘do you need sun cream’ part? The ‘what’s the quickest way to the airport’ part? The ‘what about an ocean view room’ part? Or the ‘can you really afford this’ part? Which is why all the parts of the Internet are on the iPhone.”

ASA took issue with that last line. Because the iPhone doesn’t support Flash or Java, there are actually quite a few parts of the Internet that aren’t available on the iPhone, which make’s the ad misleading in ASA’s eyes. “Because the iPhone doesn’t support Flash or Java, you couldn’t really see the Internet in its full glory,” ASA spokesperson Olivia Campbell told the BBC. “They made a very general claim that you can see the Internet in its entirety, and actually that’s not quite true.”

Maybe, maybe not. Depends on how you look at it. Because truthfully, the iPhone can access Flash and Java content. It just doesn’t doesn’t render it. In any event, the ASA is an independent organization, not a government one so it can’t exactly enforce its ban on the commercial at issue here, anyway.