Not only does Apple get to celebrate its future release of OS X Lion and the hype surrounding the new Macbook Air, they get to laugh in the face of Research In Motion (RIM), too. Apple has now overtaken RIM for second place in worldwide smart phone share.

Apple only trails one company when it comes to smart phone market share, and that company is Nokia. The third-quarter global smart phone share report from Strategy Analytics states that Apple has ousted RIM by 3.1 percentage points. It’s such an impressive undertaking by Apple, given that only three years ago there was no such thing as an iPhone.

However, I believe this is a bigger loss for RIM. If RIM wants to be able to stay competitive, it’s time for the company to completely overhaul its Blackberry platform — rebuild it from the ground up — as what the company offers now just isn’t cutting it. The aging mobile operating system has failed to stay relevant in a world where hyper-connected social smart phones have taken priority; social features were merely an afterthought with Blackberry.

Nokia now faces pressure from Apple to perform, as its 11.1-percent lead over Apple is dwindling.

I’ll give it a year or two before Apple takes the lead in worldwide smart phone market share. By then it will be Apple and Google battling it out for control.