This is why..

[Jay Vaughan]

Joost and I spent last weekend hacking on iPhone projects .. he got  
some nice sound code of his, that he's had floating around for years,  
working finally and I got my act together on the setup for a bit of 3D  
hacking and cross-platform compatability with other projects on my  
table .. but now I'm beginning to wonder if it wasn't just a wasted  
effort and we should have focused on Zii Egg/Plaszma instead of  
bothering with the iPhone lockstep.

The fact is, the more Apples grip tightens, the more likely someone is  
going to come along and slurp up the customers and developers escaping  
from their clutches .. and Creative Labs' Zii Egg is really, really  
sexy hardware.

Sexier than the next iPod release, I'm quite sure .. and the  
development tools?

Linux-based.

Yes, they've got an App store, in beta right now as ZiiLife, which  
also includes such wonders as free Egg-to-Desktop services, free video  
conferencing, and so on.  If this thing hits soon, it will steal a lot  
of thunder from Apple.

So, yeah .. I hope we see a nice move from Creative on this issue  
soon, in the form of a product release of the Egg, and maybe a ZiiPad  
too .. they've got all the technology in functional form to compete  
with Apple, and it may well happen.

BTW, you can run Plaszma on the Egg, or Android.  Your choice.   
Expansion comes in the form of an SD card slot - no fixed memory  
restraints there.  And the processor is actually quite a bit sexier  
than the A4, imho .. the only issue is maturity of the built-in apps,  
but I see that moving quite fast.

;
--
Jay Vaughan