Well, I've seen some of the replies of old forum posters and developers, so I thought I'd bring in the view of a regular Joe.

Please excuse Regular Joe, he's a bit unpolished.

Great. Hey, I'm happy for you. You do realize that I don't see them, since I don't run MeeGo. Great for marketing, though.

When do you expect to see unstable M5 bugfix releases?

I know that M6/Meego is Nokia's future, but I'd give it all for a nice feature pack for N900. I don't know what I'll be running in a year.

*raises hand*

Someone had to say it. Regular Joe is here to take one for the team.

"Why?", you ask in my imaginary world.

Here you go: Imagine you and a few friends go up and build this awesome treehouse. Complete with painted "No girls allowed" sign, windows, the works. It will be your masterpiece.

You cash in your allowance for the next 6 months, buy the wood, and you and your friends start building. In a couple of months, they show up with what they have done for you open platform -er- treehouse. We all happily build the doors, while someone brings over an old fridge to keep juice in, which was deemed too much by Dad, who thought MMS would be too much. I mean fridge, fridge would be too much. For the treehouse.

About a quarter way through the build, Jim, the neighbor kid comes over the fence and says that he's building an even bigger house, and his dad, let's call him -say- Intel, is helping him build it. They all go over the other side and happily start helping.

Sure some of them come over from time to time, buy/make all the nice stuff will be in the bigger house, and you can't build an even bigger house because your platform is now old, with design limitations. Plus, you've spend your money on wood and his house is all carbon fiber.

With time, they either bring stuff over that is temporary, meant for Jim's house once it's done, or they stop bringing it over and saving it. Also, they help halfheartedly, some too tired from working over the fence.

What's worst is not that by the time your house is done it will be old. It's not that theirs will be bigger and finished first. What really hurts is that at the rate they help, it might never be finished.

Jim is not my enemy because I don't make enemies over tree houses, platforms or versions. But if I just moved Jim to the top of my list out of spite.

Maybe it will go away if I'm allowed in his cool new treehouse and abandon my pile of wood. I'm having a hard time forgetting Jim put up an official sign that I'm not allowed in. I hope my relation will warm up.

Didn't Maemo say the exact same thing, before not needing me any more? Wasn't N900/Fremantle the best and opennest yet, a promise for the future, a look up, etc?

Doesn't that mean that if I do help, the next version will need me because it will be the opennestestest?

Also, I think you misspelled Nokia. It's not Meego that needs me, it's Nokia that needs me. As it needed me to believe in a platform, purchase it, and then close my suggestion as DONTCARE when I wanted a feature that helps me manage my contacts (number labels), keep track of birthdays (age after name), set alarms (not on day before for birthdays).

All of those are non-ridiculous, easy to fix stuff my 7650 did in 2002. Or was it the 7110? I'm pretty sure 7110 had age after name in 1999. "It was announced in February 1999 and released in October 1999[2]. Nowadays, it has achieved cult status and is considered to be one of the most stylish cellphones ever made".

I don't recall Nokia needing me to believe in that phone.

What you need is more people who believe in the platform (no matter what you make of it), believe in the release (until it gets changed), and keep believing. I agree completely. You need more of THOSE people. I wish you luck, those people are hard to find, especially since you don't pay them, they pay you.

If Contacts is bound by Nokia internal todo list, and Meego is bound by its internal todo list, what exactly do you need me for? Stand outside and project my support with a sign not caring what's on it?

I swear, if it wasn't so bitter I'd have it as a signature: I believe in OS 2006 (crossed out) OS 2007 (crossed out)
OS 2008 (crossed out) Maemo 5 (crossed out) Maemo 6 (crossed out) MeeGo (crossed out) Whatever comes after that!