Like I already said, I went a bit overboard intentionally to make a point - many people were doing their iPhone vs. N900 dance and I gave it a different spin. That's all. As for iPhone experience, I admit mine is limited, but enough to know my iPod touch experience (which I do own) is comparable for the purposes of what I wrote. E.g. browsing and media-playing.

No, I am not kidding. The improved resolution on the N900 makes a huge difference in browsing web and album covers. It makes it much easier to handle larger amounts of information at a time. As for exaggerations, sure, I was exaggerating somewhat to make a point.

Sure, I could jailbreak, but that is an unsupported road - and a hassle like you said - that I'm not interested in taking. It is also very much true there is more content for the iPhone/iPod touch ecosystem, I will probably continue to enjoy some of that content on my iPod touch. But to be able to multitask smoothly even just between browser and other basic applications is a big thing for me. And the multi-tasking/application selector is nice.

I don't know what your expectations of smooth browsing are, but so far it looks very good to me. Flash is also very usable in many cases, much more so than on my iPod touch - where... well, it isn't. Trust me, I've browsed a lot on the iPod touch and the N900 experience is simply superior. The better resolution, ability to use a stylus, hardware keyboard for entering text (without blocking half the screen when doing so) and Flash support all come together in a way that is a vast improvement over my iPod touch (or iPhone). I'm sure I know what you mean by "smoothly" in relation to the iPhone/iPod touch, but to me that is simply irrelevant compared to the other benefits in browsing on N900.

I have no answer to your question what can be replaced, I just know Apple does not allow one to replicate functionality via the official App Store - and Nokia on Maemo has no such restrictions. It goes to the potential of the device - and that is interesting at this point. Just like opening an X term on the Maemo, it gives a sense of open road. We shall see. I wouldn't be praising Nokia for solely advancing on their own roadmap, if what they are doing wasn't interesting for me or people like me...

You seem like a technology enthusiast from your writing. Surely you can understand why Maemo sounds and seems interesting, appealing? Maybe it will fail, but at this point the interest and potential is there... and that is one nice thing about the N900. To be on the starting block of something new and different. Because the Maemo approach certainly is different compared to iPhone. Interesting to see how all this "openness" pans out.

I am not saying Maemo is the only game in town, but it does take a different spin on things - and this is maemo.org. I'm sure there is much potential in many other technologies.

Look, my post was not about playing music, it was about perspective and expectations. Take the music part as a side-step, if you will. I never intended to load my music onto the phone, I was perfectly happy using the iPod touch for that. But once I felt how intuitive it was to browse around Maemo with stylus (and fingers occasionally) I felt like I wanted to. And you know what, it works very smooth for me. Other than the playlist management which was explored and found lacking (I don't manage playlists on a mobile device ever), it does what I need it to do well. And browsing dozens of album covers on that high-res screen beats cover flow anytime.

I continue to re-iterate my point: iPhone shouldn't be on that list. It is not comparable. It is not useable as a mobile computer, and that, is what N900 is - a mobile computer (that also features phone functionality).