Nokia's Linux-based internet tablet was Amazon's best selling computer in 2007, and top 3 personal computer in holiday sales. Congratulations to the maemo team!
There was some discussion on Amazon's listings on Slashdot. As I've noted every year has recently been predicted as the one when Linux desktop takes over I thought this comment particularly insightful:
Now, the "Linux Desktop" fantasists can finally let it go. There will be no "year of the Linux desktop", just as there will be no "year of the Linux mainframe".
...
Pushing for a change in the desktop from Windows to Mac or Linux is, in 10 years, going to seem like striving to continue the VMS vs Unix wars on the VAX platform.
What 2008, 2009, and 2010 are going to be are the "years where appliances took over half the desktop functions" - you still want a big monitor and ergo keyboard to Photoshop, do development of web pages and code, and so on. But people sitting right at their desktop will whip out their paperback-sized appliance to do E-mail and chat, because that's where their communication apps live.
And, yes, those new appliances will mostly run Linux. What else?
As I've seen the nice, new N810 internet tablet take over more and more roles from my MacBook I can only agree.
