Sometimes, when you've realized you've made the grave mistake of pissing in your pants, the best time to take a course of action is midstream. Given Anssi Vanjoki's idiotic quote, it's particularly ironic that going with Microsoft's mobile platform turned out to be so much more like pissing in your pants to keep warm in the winter--only without even the benefit of any of the warmth at all.

I find the last three paragraphs particularly prophetic in their apocalyptic outlook for Nokia:

"Nokia would essentially be reduced to nothing more than another OEM offering up Android on near identical handsets. Any sense of differentiation between the firm and its Asian rivals would be lost in an instant, the company scrapping for market share with fewer weapons in its arsenal as a result.

Instead, Nokia is set to push it new line up of smartphones – which include the Symbian^3 powered N8 – as a credible rival to Android in the run up to Christmas.

It's also become clear than even with Symbian^4 on the schedule, it's Nokia and Intel's joint venture MeeGo - first devices due 2011 - that the company's longterm profitability hangs on."

In the end, that's exactly what they became anyway--just another OEM, only for a far more obscure platform.. AND worse, they didn't even take advantage of their supposed ability to differentiate themselves from other Windows mobile devices by customizing or improving the operating system in any way for themselves. I'm not even sure Microsoft would let them, despite their public agreement to be able to do so.