With the recent rumours going on over twitter that the n900 release date has been pushed to november and various discussions regarding:

1. Portrait mode
2. USB OTG
3. Eldar's comments that the firmware is not ready....

What do you guys prefer?

Later with no bugs and more features.

No such thing as software without bugs, I prefer they release it when they are satisified with it.

On the other hand I can't wait to get my hands on it

Well, considering how much extra time it would take to implement 1 and 2 and knowing Eldar's comments are more or less BS anyways*, we're getting "release early with some bugs".

Honestly, I think if they were going to hold back another six months without a product announcement, a hell of a lot of people here would have already lost interest.

* The firmware is going to be changing all the way up until release anyways and he's clearly using way older firmware to begin with.

Bugs are now an opportunity for community engagement.

November? I didn't read that... and Twitter is perhaps just rumors.

The open source way is release early, release often

Portrait mode and USB OTG are not bugs. They are features. The question is: are such features worth a product delay? And if yes, how long delay?

There are always bugs in a final release except in mission critical software such as those running on airplanes, missiles, and space shuttles (many of which run VMS). That is why there are reliability and security updates.

Right after product release some people die to buy the next best thing. Yet, if you wait a while, the price goes down whereas initial quirks are known and solved (or known to be a negative aspect of the device not being solved). Likewise, if you buy a second hand car which is 2 or 3 years old you get it for 50% of the initial price.

ideally: I prefer later with no bugs
realistically: even if it's later, it will contain bugs. That's the fate of software

But I voted later with no bugs, hoping that all huge bugs have been killed and we are left with smaller and not too problematic bugs.

Then it depends on what kind of software/hardware I'm buying: a device such as the N900 upon which I may rely for work, I want it to be rock solid, on the other hand I can live with a few bugs in whatever game or non-essential electronic gadget...

There's no such thing as no bugs (unless you're Donald Knuth maybe), so generally speaking I'd prefer early with some bugs with the provision that resources will be allocated for those bugs to be fixed promptly (read: not in Harmattan).

I am by no means a developer so won't comment on how difficult no-bugs-release would be. I can't wait to get my hands on this device, so I rather have it sooner than later and play my part as a guineapig if I need to. I guess community feedback increases after release so at least in theory it could hasten the smoothing out of the software after that. Did that make any sense...