and neither do i consider it. but i keep seeing people that import it, jailbreaked, as it cant be legally bought in norway. and people praise the browser as if its the first time one could get a product that does real web on the pocket. its as if the nokia devices never existed.

and if you talk the iphone down and/or bring the N8x0 into the conversation you get stuff like "oh but the N8x0 isnt a phone", "it does not have multi-touch", "but its a real smartphone, ones jailbreaked one can install all kinds of app on it" and so on...

apple have grabbed a mindshare like nothing else. people that never considered a N800 or a WM/symbian smartphone is all over the iphone.

and as i think about it, one reason could be that it integrates with the existing apple ecosystem. as in, its a ipod (full sync with itunes), its a phone and you can browse the web on it (facebook, myspace, the whole social networking thing).

while both android and maemo may be more flexible and all that, apple got the mindshare outside of the geek sphere. hell, just today im reading about something as "silly" as a virtual piano on the iphone. there has been a explosion of development for it, and thats even before one can officially install third party stuff on it.

Seems to date from the 10th (of February). Looks like PyAno is earlier, that's one more iFanboy bashing argument... Unfortunately, we don't have multi-touch hardware, so they do have the benefit WRT chords. Still, we were there first, and they even copied Ty's name. iAno indeed...

You do realize the iPhone already has this, and has from day one, right?

heh, why am i not surprised...

When I was using it in the store, testing out the SMS applet, I couldn't get the virtual keyboard into landscape mode, no. Portrait only. I'll admit that was back in September, but at the time, the apple store folks said it was one of the things you could only do in portrait mode.

Got any pics of it (keyboard or SMS) in landscape mode?

According to this Gizmodo review of the iPhone:
That text appears just below a photo of the keyboard in landscape mode.

Aah. Then I ammend that to "a landscape virtual keyboard that is usable with all applets, not just safari".

They don't care about "open" per se, but they DO care about the results of openness.

Also, I don't believe most customers put fashion over function. Some, but not most. See: Apple's OS market share vs Microsoft's.

But this does bring one of the keys to success: marketing. The key to Android's success will be the marketing from the handset company that uses it. The ability to build hype with the average user / non-techno crowd will be the measure of success for the platform.

All of us reading this forum recognize the real reasons for platform success: functionality/openness/SDK availability/blah blah blah. But when you see an N810 on popular TV shows -- THAT's the device that people will want.

Eventually, the hype will give way to questions of real usefullness, but by then devices are in the hands of consumers. THe fact that the iPhone is severely restricted in terms of functionality is irrelevant when people in Norway are importing them.

[ASIDE: I wonder whether Internet Tablet placement in last summer's movies boosted sales. I'm going to doubt it, because brand recognition was probably low.]

if your refering to the 770 in the fantastic four movie, the device was on its way of market so...