The 'spirit' of the N8** is the portability combined with connectivity and compatibility -- eg, bluetooth keyboards, various file types, older software. The product is very successful, and there is no reason why 'success' whould be equated with widespread adoption. By that reasoning, John Grisham would be far more successful than, I don't know, Faulkner.

Well, the point is, we all have different notions of what the 'spirit' of N8** is, but I don't think it is Maemo. Again, it is the combination of the form factor and compatibility -- one would have to make some pretty clever points to convince me otherwise. I suppose they could come up with a N900 that is simply a desktop computer, but the spirit would be missing, wouldn't it.