Why do the fart apps always need to be mentioned? If there's silly and outright stupid apps among the tens of thousands of apps available for a platform, it doesn't mean that there wouldn't be plenty of useful ones too.

Nonsense. So what, Android has 20 unique apps? There's plenty of apps for the same thing, yes. But there's also plenty of apps for things not available on Maemo.

There's more apps for these other platforms, period. Also, why would it be bad to have lots of choice about what type of application for use X to install? When I got my Android phone, I looked at the available RSS feed readers (plenty, as you can imagine. No, not quite 500), installed 3 or 4 of them and kept the one I liked the best. Does that sound a bad thing? I was actually very happy about this since I've never liked the N810 RSS reader and I'm actually quite picky about how I want it to look, etc. I found a nice one.

Admitting the facts (as in, Maemo does NOT have as good a selection in apps as the other platform) might be a good starting point for improving the situation. It really doesn't accomplish anything to claim that the other platforms don't have any good ones available and to claim that the other app stores / markets are not any better. They are, admit it. The selection of apps (both unique apps and apps that do the same thing) is better on those other platforms at the moment. Looking forward to the day when the situation is more equal.

Also: code a fart app. Please. That'd be fun.