And how many of these are as functional as maemo?

Just for knowledge's sake. KDE isn't an OS. It's a user interface that goes on top of the OS.

Define "as functional". Poky certainly isn't, but Debian definitely opens up a lot (the whole Debian armel catalog, in fact) more options (especially to the developer or power user)*and Mamona, while immature, will eventually offer a much more open platform.

Being less intentionally thick, none, as Nokia's binary stuff gets in the way off effective using of alternative OSes. Debian, though, with working sound and improved input methods would be a very good alternative to maemo.

This means that you will essentially get nokia's permission before any OS can have a chance in hell of taking over maemo. I don't see Nokia giving permission for a competing OS anytime soon. Heck, they don't even give details about new products. As I understand it, critical parts of maemo are closed and Nokia did that for a reason. Perhaps to prevent other OS's.

No, this simply isn't true nor does it make any sense. Nokia is not Microsoft (nor Apple), and they don't make one red cent from maemo or ITOS, so preventing users from using alternatives to ITOS makes no sense (particularly since that ability actually adds value to their product).

There are two basic reasons parts of the platform are closed. The first, is simply because there are parts that aren't Nokia's parts to open (wifi, bluetooth drivers, some TI stuff, etc.), and the second, is because Nokia's management philosophy is consumer-device oriented (and largely outdated, but that's besides the point), so protecting their proprietary information (particularly stuff related to the retu and tahvo chips, which are important parts of Nokia cellphones) from the prying eyes of consumers and (to a larger extent for some stuff, particularly user-land stuff) competitors is an integral part of their thinking.

Now, that's not to say I agree with these decisions (I don't, though I can understand and accept the reasoning), but facts are facts and we wouldn't be here in the same shape today (truthfully, we wouldn't be here period) if Nokia didn't launch with closed components. Unfortunate, yes, but it's no conspiracy.

I point everybody to this thread on the maemo-users mailing list. Hope hasn't run out for the 770 in any case.

There's a third reason why some parts of ITOS are closed: Nokia management (at some point in the 770 development cycle, at least) thought their UI was value-add on top of Maemo, and a USP (unique selling point).

That's why some of the UI-level code is closed source - or was, historically. Annoyingly, there was bits which were open going closed such as tablet-browser-ui and some GPS stuff.

Java is available from the jalimo project. However, when I tried it recently the J2ME support was not all there - so apps that "run on any cellular phone" probably won't work. Also somewhat slow IMO, but then Java seems to need a huge amount of RAM to run at a decent speed on a server/desktop.