[slashnik]

I love your post.

NB tho, Symbian already knew (see 1998) how to make a "truly excellent mobile GUI" - sure, it was a PDA, but we were already making phone UIs with phone licensees then, and could happily have made a "well-designed high-level UI framework".

I'd've loved that "parallel universe".

Alas, the Symbian deal nixed it, and our new owners simply wanted us to make their kind of phone platforms for them: four whole new ones, in 18 months (heh right), mainly to their specs, while recruiting 100 new devs and 10 new designers.

So I feel it's a little harsh to say "the biggest failing of Symbian was to disown the UI" -- we never had the option to keep control of it. (It was a major failing of the Symbian deal itself, sure.)