[razzimatazz]

I'm glad my asuss eee is gone now, but in 2011 it was a fabulous travel aid for exploring italy - keeping us out of icky internet cafes and keeping us entertained on the long slow (railpass compliant) rail journeys.

Netbooks became of course the small and underpowered laptop that many rely upon today. They also perhaps provided some of the foundation for iPad's success - giving Apple a clear starting point from which to market a much nicer portable internet device.

[timr]

Me too. I bought one for a trip around Europe in 2010 or so. I wanted something:

* small and light

* cheap enough that I wouldn't cry if it was lost or stolen in sketchy hostels

* capable of using the web and checking email

Since there wasn't an iPad back then, and the iPhone was an expensive theft target, the eee was a perfect fit. The fact that it ran Linux was also cool. A year or two later I bought a MacBook Air and used that for the same purpose (more expensive, but I wasn't staying in hostels much at that point).

I'm not sure if the author was a child at the time or what, but these obviously fit a niche.