Thankfully, this isn't a "normal" device, relative to other devices out there on the market. The N900 is an open software platform. I can work on it and replace the bits I don't like. I can fix things and improve things to my heart's content (and time budget).
This is why I see not just some light but full-on rainbows-in-technicolor-glory at the end of the tunnel. When Qt hits this device in all its glory, there will be a very powerful stack of software that works very well on these kinds of devices that we are very familiar with and already have a ton of software built on top of. At Tokamak 4 we will have a few N900s, all of which will be sporting Plasma interfaces before we leave I'm sure, along with 4 smartphone-ish devices from Intel to give similarly loving to.
Right now, as I type these words, I am imagining this device with a beautiful Plasma powered interface. Qt applications galore, a sensible melding between apps and widgets and a more unified UI experience that not only blends with but works seamlessly with my laptop and netbook with all of that wonderful, wonderful hardware pulsing and beating beneath it, driven by what looks like a rather nice kernel and userland.
The N900 (and other such devices) are ours to make in our own image. They can be, and as a result will indeed become, more than they have been originally designed to be. This is what happens when a shared commons is allowed to blossom with Free innovation and Free market concepts.
