By Graham K. Rogers

I have recently highlighted a couple of instances in which Bloomberg seemed determined to make a case against Apple, with doctored quotes, revelations that are nothing new and a biased survey: Wall Street on Apple innovation.

It is not only Bloomberg (who have had their own credibility problems with leaky terminals) whose reporting on Apple is less than balanced as the New York Times has a record of blaming Apple (Foxconn) and conveniently forgetting other manufacturers who use the same services.

Now Philip Elmer-DeWitt highlights a situation when some sources praise Samsung reports of 10 million Galaxy S4 units shipped to carriers in 4 weeks (not sales), while the sales of iPhones - 5 million in 3 days - are reported as "disappointing".

The reason for the disappointment being once more that analysts estimate how many iPhones will be sold and when the actual figures fail to meet their guesses (no matter how wild), instead of blaming their own inaccurate work, blame Apple. That is a a much easier target and guaranteed to bring more hits.

Graham K. Rogers teaches at the Faculty of Engineering, Mahidol University in Thailand where he is also Assistant Dean. He wrote in the Bangkok Post, Database supplement on IT subjects. For the last seven years of Database he wrote a column on Apple and Macs.