I have to say that I was pretty disappointed with maps on the N900 after coming from android. That said, I was with android for nearly a year before a turn by turn navigation arrived via third party paid application... and it looks like i'm not going to have to wait that long this time. Well done Sygic for filling the void, but i feel sorry for my bank balance.

I appreciate that maemo 5 is under development, and that the situation is likely to improve given time, I just wasnt anticipating a wait for basic functionality from the manufacturer. Hell, back in 2007 maps on my old N95 was better than that on the N900. Maybe it was stupid of me, but I was expecting some tangible forward progression over Symbian with the release of Maemo 5.

The announcement of free turn by turn navigation on a range of older handsets which already have better maps software than the supposed flagship device does therefore feel a bit like a slap in the face. Its like Nokia are icing a turd and ignoring that nice cake they just baked.

Users are left asking - why? From Nokia sources, it looks like one reason they chose to do this was to focus development on Maemo 6. This raises a whole different issue.

It suggests that Nokia are focusing prematurely on the Maemo 6 platform at the risk of alienating a whole bunch of N900 early adopters. This kinda makes me feel that we might be being used as guinea pigs for development and paying a premium for the experience. I hope this isn't the case.

From all this I think its fair enough to ask Nokia if the N900 is likely to run M6, and / or, if M5 mapping is going to be cleaned up enough to bring it in line with the functionality of existing Symbian devices at least. I don't care about free stuff - i want functioning stuff.

Hopefully this has just been a case of bad PR, but it could put people off joining the community at a time when it should be gathering support.

Rant over. Thanks for letting me vent.