The release of Apple's latest mobile software system, iOS 8, was riddled with major bugs, and Apple customers actually seem to care. They are adopting the new software update more slowly than they did past releases.

The company said on a webpage that as of last Sunday 47 per cent of Apple mobile devices are running iOS 8 after it was released about two-and-a-half weeks ago. That is a much lower adoption rate than that of the previous version, iOS 7, which was running on about 70 per cent of devices about two-and-a-half weeks after its release, according to an estimate by Mixpanel. The blog MacRumors earlier spotted the statistic.

There are a couple of popular theories for why people might be picking up iOS 8 more slowly. For one, they could have heard about the serious bugs, such as the one that temporarily caused some users’ phones to stop working. For another, the software update requires a significant amount of storage on the device – about five gigabytes – when it is installed wirelessly over the internet.

Single audience

Why should anyone care? For Apple, it is a big plus when a large amount of people grab the latest iOS: the newest system is made to work best on newer phones, and that encourages people with older devices to eventually buy new ones. As for third-party software developers selling apps through Apple’s App Store, it is more efficient to focus on building apps for a single audience running the same software system.

"If you're a developer, you want the largest possible base of devices to be able to use your app, but if half the people with iPhones are on iOS 7 or earlier, the addressable market becomes a lot smaller," said Jan Dawson, an independent technology analyst for Jackdaw Research.

Apple declined to comment, but the company is expected to release soon the next update, iOS 8.1, which will probably be more stable than the current one and could persuade more people to update. – ( New York Times)