Nokia does have a potential gem with Maemo, but they really need to get in the game and make something out of it. They’ve had five years and haven’t yet reached the mainstream, while Apple and Google have produce polished user experiences and delivered them to the masses. Nokia needs to stabilize the Maemo development platform, stop yanking the rug from under developers by switching toolkits and technologies and dropping last year’s hardware with every new platform release. They need to polish the user experience (fewer modal dialogs; better touch UI; things like xterm should be an optional app for developers, not shipped as a default app; etc.). And they need to focus all their effort on one platform (today’s news that Meego would be their only future high-end smartphone OS is a ray of hope).

Google now has *five* times Nokia’s market cap.

“If the question is where I’d put my money, it’s not going to be into Google, anymore than it’d be into the Irish housing market at the moment.”

So did you put it into Nokia instead? Good way to lose over 40% of it in 9 months. (Google is down 7% in the same period, Apple is up 42%.)

That’s certainly true (and no, I didn’t miss it), and it’s underlined by the apparent conflict of Boingo’s claim that Airports are the top usage area for wifi usage in the US and JiWire’s claim that Hotel/Resort usage is the top usage area (55%) with Airports in second place (27%) (again, for the US). JiWire’s more diverse data sources would seem to explain this discrepancy.

There are three things to note on your point however:

1. Firstly, high-end phones are the target market for most app writers in one form or another – few are writing for S40 phones or lower;
2. Secondly, it’s not just business use that they’re seeing in Airports. While it’s not directly comparable, it is interesting to note that in Cafe usage, JiWire is pointing out that 83% of all wifi usage is for either pure business or a mix of business and fun. Ruling out high end phones as used by business users from a non-business target audience may not be as valid as you think; and
3. Thirdly, JiWire’s broader data and Boingo’s more focussed data both give the same end picture as regards wifi access from handheld devices. JiWire sees more iPod Touch devices than Boingo does, but in both cases, the iPhone and iPod between them take over 90% of the market (97.8% in JiWire’s data, 93.9% in Boingo’s).

I don’t buy that as an accurate valuation of Google, any more than I buy that Facebook has a actual value in the billions. Nokia’s valuation is based on actual physical goods designed, manufactured and shipped, as well as the more speculative aspects of its future deals in various markets. If the question is where I’d put my money, it’s not going to be into Google, anymore than it’d be into the Irish housing market at the moment.

Actually, Google’s market capitalization is three times larger than Nokia’s (65% of Finland’s annual GDP, versus 21% for Nokia). Google’s revenue is much smaller, but their net income is about the same. I think that Google qualifies as “big” by any measure.