Apple has taken its share of grief for supposedly being slow to release new models of the iPhone. Some industry analysts have suggested that by sticking to its one-a-year release schedule, the company is falling behind faster-iterating competitors and therefore possibly leaving money on the table.

Yet, those competitors – Samsung especially – are now encountering their own problems. Both Samsung and HTC are seeing slower-than-expected sales of their latest devices, while perennial laggards Nokia and BlackBerry aren’t doing any better. What’s going on looks pretty clear: the most advanced smartphone markets are approaching saturation points, meaning that people are quite happy with their existing devices. They don’t necessarily want or need new ones, or at least not every couple of months.

I had this pointed out to me from a completely non-business perspective on my recent trip to South Korea, by a Buddhist monk, no less.