@nicola.mfb: yeah, all good points.

I think the key is within the marketplace and the distribution (sales and marketing) of the platform. High technical standards and elegant designs only matter to geeks and people in the know.

One thing I notice was that many of Symbian based contents (apps, games) were sold through carriers and pay-per-call channels. From what I know, they charge a BOATLOAD if you want to distribute content through their system. That's why iPhone's 30:70 split was looked at favorably by the developers (which was then followed by Android and also Amazon's kindle).

I don't know how much carriers charge for this service (distribution, billing, etc) nowadays, but if they haven't move closer to the magical 30/70 number, that will still be a big deterrent to the platform's success.