"Hello, bug name electronics store? I'd like to order a DysonStation 4..."
"We'll have the installers right out."
"What installers?"
"The installers have to remove your carpet and re-lay it with our special layer underneath which tracks your footsteps. It's for your safety, and to ensure you're only using your vacuum on approved parts of the floor."
"But......"
"As a disclaimer, some customers have reported getting locked out of their houses because they weigh too much, or walk into an unapproved room."
-click-
"Hello, I'd like to order the new OuyaRoomba."
When the device and its software are subject to central managment, YOU don't manage the device, THEY do. That's the point!
Exactly! So they should go get an iPad!
....Wait. Shit!
If your power goes out, what then?
That's actually a perfect example. When the power goes out, the rooftop generators kick on and everything continues.
When your business relies entirely on services provided by other parties, you're just asking to be marginalized. If something in some remote datacenter causes your virtual host to completely disappear, you don't have a guy to jog down the hall and see what's up. All you have is a phone call to customer support.
The Vita at least has Sony backing.
This is exactly why I would prefer this device over a Vita.
However, I too have been looking for a solution now that Apple is moving in the iOS-y direction for OS X, in terms of a system that lets me keep the awesome BSD power of Mac OS without being confined to Apple's walled garden of App Store restrictions etc.
Sounds like what you're looking for is... BSD.
"Success covers a multitude of blunders." -- George Bernard Shaw