Meego, But What Happened?

So.... an article over at Engadget today entitled "Dear Nokia, You Cannot Be Serious" written by Vlad Savov laments Nokia's decision to jump ship to Windows Phone after he's used the new Nokia N9. I've taken a look at all the material I could get my hands on in the short period of time since this news broke loose, and I do have to say, it's impressive to say the least. It's Android simplicity, Windows Phone styling (to a point), and a whole new way to use your phone. Sort of a Sense UI meets Windows Phone 7 I suppose.

Now I'm a huge Android fan. I love stock Android for christ's sake, the most plain and straightforward version there is. I do have to say, though, that the Harmattan UI is exactly what I've been looking for in a phone. It is:

A. Something Microsoft didn't make.

B. Extremely simple, but not to the point of missing features.

C. Efficient. (running a now antiquated OMAP 3xxx core)

D. Beautiful.

There is one massive thing wrong with MeeGo at this moment however, and that is what Stephen Elop best put as "a battle of ecosystems". It has none. Sure, there has been some speculation that Nokia was going to pull a "Playbook" and allow Android apps to run through a version of the Dalvik VM, but that doesn't translate into Android Market access and they certainly don't want developers writing code for Android to target a MeeGo phone. There are no apps available, and there probably never will be. Even if they had released the "burning platform" with the intention of going full-speed-ahead on its development, there are already developers writing programs for mature and fully developed platforms that are making money hand over fist. Why on earth would they switch?

They wouldn't. Nokia is simply too late in the game to be able to sway developers toward MeeGo and Mr. Elop probably realized that.

I hate to say it, but Windows Phone is still the way to go, no matter how awesome Nokia's best and final OS effort is in and of itself.

UPDATE: And just like that, the very next day marks Stephen Elop's presentation of their newest Windows Phone 7 device and his confirmation that he doesn't actually care to sell or develop MeeGo based phones any longer. He said that he intends to take key ideas from it and apply these things to the joint development of Microsoft's mobile OS effort. See the video over at This is my next for the full speech and presentation. Try to tolerate the first generation text-to-voice guy after Mr. Elop.