Using the same operating system and just replacing the mouse with a stylus (or finger) will not lead to success. There were many smartphones before iPhone, they never became that popular. If you think it is only because of marketing, you are way too geeky to see beyond a feature matrix. Hardware is only part of the puzzle, interface and software are in some ways more important. Whether iPad gets us there is another question, but touchscreen "laptops" will be a lot more common in the near future. If any company wants to get there, they need an appropriate operating system for it. Unfortunately, there are not that many alternatives out there, yet.Exactly. I thoroughly expect that by next holiday shopping season, there will be Win7 tablet devices that take a dump on the iPad.