The fact there's only been mostly one Maemo or MeeGo device released at a time - overlap for the N800/N810 and the (not publicly released) N950 and N9 - is the same scenario at the core of the problem(s) as WP7 and iOS, a lack of real options.

The fact that Android still suffers from lag (not at a vanilla AOSP level though) when Samsung puts their TouchWiz UI on top of Android shows me that optimization has not been a priority for those manufacturers - just through another core, add another 512mb of RAM or fracture your own platform and sell a quad-core with 1gb of RAM in Europe, settle for a different dual-core in the North American market but same amount of RAM, or up the RAM to 2gb and sell that in Japan... and offer absolutely no rhyme or reason.

Fragmentation talk has been going on for a couple of years around Android, it's finally starting to take its toll. Do I think things could be better? Hell yes. But then looking at Qt based offers, I'm not sure that even resolves a damn thing. It's just potentially another release/platform that will not be optimized, be back-ported (as the case with Diablo) or require hardware to make it shine.

My point though; Harmattan was a one-off on just the N9 (public releases people, remember). Fremantle - another one-off with the N900. WP7 - a one-off in regards to the hardware. And they all are disappointing in either support, experience, apps or acceptance.

Android is all over. iOS is controlled and sealed off. The middle needs to be found and cultivated.

It hasn't happened yet.

And about all of this "it doesn't do proper multi-tasking" talk yet, seriously... that's not a selling point. Neither are the hyperbole of "fart apps" either. People want productivity - selling the Playbook without an e-mail/PIM basically doomed that product from the start - and people want an easier UI/UX, that's what iOS brought to the table in 2007, that's what TouchWiz and Sense bring to the Android stable (while fragmenting the hell out of that sector) and that's what Harmattan did but didn't get the marketing or funding it sorely needed.

Let's see what BB10 and Tizen bring to the table. Qt... meh. Let's see if it helps or hurts. So far, it's just a way to get things done.