There’s a story on The Street today titled, “Lookout Apple, Here Comes Microsoft: Surface Tablets Break Into Top 5.” Sounds impressive, right?

Sounds even more impressive when the writer, Gary Krakow, follows up with:

According to IDC’s first quarter numbers, Microsoft’s tablet shipments increased 142% to 49.2 million units compared to the same period a year ago.

Wait, what?

I checked IDC’s press release and this is what it actually says:

Worldwide tablet shipments continue to surge, growing 142.4% year over year in the first quarter of 2013 […] Tablet shipments totaled 49.2 million units in 1Q13…

That’s for all tablet makers, not just Microsoft.

According to IDC, Microsoft shipped about 900,000 for 1.8% share of the market. Apple shipped 19.5 million iPads or 39.6% of the market.

Even if The Street read their own story, they would see it makes no sense.