Nokia "Management" are to blame for the current situation.

As it stands, Nokia are about to lose the smartphone market entirely.

Which basically means Nokia's "only" market will be low to mid price mobile phones. The days of selling high-end devices are beginning to drift past Nokia.

Now Nokia still have the majority marketshare of mobile phones in general and will probably be that way for some time. They are very good at it.

But markets change and technology moves at a very fast rate.

Unless Nokia get MeeGo right then the last chance of being a smartphone player will have passed.

One of the major selling points of devices like iPhone and android is the availability of applications. Both Apple and Google understand this very well and Nokia completely misses this.

My friends who recently bought either iPhone or android all say the same thing "I want download and play with the cool applications".

This is beyond Nokia's understanding and this is why they are doing so badly at the moment.

The OVI store is a joke. My partner has a nokia 5800 and has downloaded a couple of apps from the store. She says she won't pay for any because "It's only a mobile phone and only cost me couple of hunded pounds". She likes my n900 but she hates using it to phone people. She thinks the gui feels wierd and prefers using her 5800.
(I know, I know the n900 is "not a phone" but it is still important)

I spent £500 on my n900. Would I buy apps for it?
Yes, I would.

Do you see?

If Nokia got the app "ecosystem" right then they would have been in a strong position to compete in the smartphone market.

At the moment Symbian is the dominant platform on Nokia devices and thier focus is on this. Which was fine until now.

I guess Nokia "Mangaement" are saying:

"Why should we change our strategy? Our mobile phones are selling really well. All we need to do is create a premiuim device with Symbian and use our existing strategy - it always worked before."

"Let me get this straight you want to use the software from our tablet devices and use it to make a mobile phone? But Symbian is for mobile phones not this new-fangled Linux stuff you kids are talking about!

Tell you what we'll increase your budget and you manufacture this tablet/phone. Present it to the board and if you are lucky do a limited release."

"Wait a minute! What do you mean you want to expand the tablet/phone Linux programme?
Are you nuts?
We are losing marketshare to Apple and Google and we need to respond quickly. We've earmarked a budget to release 3 new Symbian-based phones and going to undercut these so called 'smartphones"...."

You get the picture...

if I was a shareholder I would be going completely nuts!

I think the people directly responsible for creating maemo and the n900 have done a fantastic job but I think they are being hamstrung by Nokia "Management".

Unless something changes then Nokia will become just another budget handset maker.