For quite a while I’ve been fascinated by the idea of owning a Linux based smartphone, which I can log into using SSH and install software on it and such. And Maemo seemed to be the thing. Later the baby was joined with MobLin and renamed to MeeGo, and the fact that it was a joint effort of Intel and Nokia made it sound like a promising idea.
Today it is clear that Nokia is not going to invest in Meego any further. Nokia announced their strategic partnership with Microsoft, hammering the final nail into Meego’s coffin. The official version of my speculation, of course sounds better:
Under the new strategy, MeeGo becomes an open-source, mobile operating system project. MeeGo will place increased emphasis on longer-term market exploration of next-generation devices, platforms and user experiences. Nokia still plans to ship a MeeGo-related product later this year.
Which I translate to: “MeeGo is a playground for experiments and we will probably not completely stop working on this one first product in the pipeline that is almost done, but don’t expect much more.”
I (barely dare to) hope I am wrong.
So the smartphone market will be dominated by three dark forces: Apple, Google and Microsoft.
Not that the announcement is a surprise, it’s just a pity that there will be no open alternative, and I was hoping for one.
Joachims Small World 