He wasn't pitching for Apple to make it, he was pitching to get Apple's OS on it. That's a big difference in who controls the stakes and Steve is a bit too much of a control freak to allow anyone else to have control over a piece of hardware with Apple's OS on it.
Of course the Sony is more refined, but the most redeeming features of the OQO are not even being realized (those features that are part of the IBM MetaPad design from which this is licensed) and that is that it is a truly modular piece of computing hardware. The computer can be removed from the LCD and be inserted into a desktop cradle or you can swap functionality by moving it to a different type of system (say slipping it into a car system.) The design is meant for the computing power to all be contained in a brick-like device that can be moved anywhere. That's where it differs from other pieces of hardware.
In its current form of a small-laptop/PDA device, it's limited. In that case, the Sony U series has it clearly beat.
But if you had an IBM T4x or X40, you could be out in that garden until 8:30am AND actually have some serious computing power (and it would stay way cooler than any G4-based laptop, so there would be no need for cooling pads that are so common in the powerbook/ibook market since they heat up so much)
Some people use their laptops for more than a walkman and a typewriter.
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He wasn't pitching for Apple to make it, he was pitching to get Apple's OS on it. That's a big difference in who controls the stakes and Steve is a bit too much of a control freak to allow anyone else to have control over a piece of hardware with Apple's OS on it.
Of course the Sony is more refined, but the most redeeming features of the OQO are not even being realized (those features that are part of the IBM MetaPad design from which this is licensed) and that is that it is a truly modular piece of computing hardware. The computer can be removed from the LCD and be inserted into a desktop cradle or you can swap functionality by moving it to a different type of system (say slipping it into a car system.) The design is meant for the computing power to all be contained in a brick-like device that can be moved anywhere. That's where it differs from other pieces of hardware. In its current form of a small-laptop/PDA device, it's limited. In that case, the Sony U series has it clearly beat.
Of course you don't care about performance... you're using a Powerbook!
But if you had an IBM T4x or X40, you could be out in that garden until 8:30am AND actually have some serious computing power (and it would stay way cooler than any G4-based laptop, so there would be no need for cooling pads that are so common in the powerbook/ibook market since they heat up so much)
Some people use their laptops for more than a walkman and a typewriter.