The fuss about Netbooks

For some time now I have thinking which would be more useful an iPhone or a Netbook. Each has it advantages and disadvantages some obvious some not so obvious. But on the go, as an IT Professional which would you rather have, the small compact but versatile iPhone or something a little more robust yet more difficult to carry around like the HP Mini 2140. Erica Sadun wrote an article about Netbooks that does a slight comparison between Netbooks and the iPhone although she focuses on the data plans. I liked the article though because it finally defined for me what a Netbook is really designed for. She states:

"In the real world, laptops let you perform serious work and let you do so without a lot of compromise. In the portable world, netbooks just aren't meant for that standard of computing. The screen is small; the keyboard is compromised; the chip runs slow. So consider them in the light of the activities that people use netbooks for: sending e-mail, browsing the net, enjoying multimedia, and chatting on the go."

Email, browsing, multimedia and chat. I'm not sure about the multimedia (unless she means just limited to music) but I will along with the rest. Light activities, not hardcore computing like video editing, gaming, or something database intensive.

For the mobile IT pros though might a Netbook be a possibility? They are cheaper then a laptop and they would be great for rdp sessions to servers which is what you use from pc at work anyway. Now if I can just justify the the required data plan. Of course you can rdp from the iPhone too.