I made a post a couple days ago about the downright zany information leaks about an upcoming MID from Dell. Employee comments were all over the place, which made it hard to figure out if Dell has been blowing particles of mercury through their air ducts or if they’re just panicking over their slippery market share. There’s more news this week, which has me leaning toward the mercury theory. I’ll start with the least crazy of the two.

Yesterday Dell announced a new option for their popular Mini line of netbooks: the Wireless 700 card. The card adds $69 to the price and adds GPS capability to your handy little netbook. Alan Sicher, senior wireless product manager at Dell, had this to say:

Smartphones already have GPS capabilities. We are now bringing it to…

Okay, stop. Yes. Smartphones already have GPS. So why are you putting it on netbooks? More and more phones, smart or otherwise, are adding GPS capabilities every day, with increasingly robust feature lists. Sorry I interrupted.

We are now bringing it to netbooks so the devices know where you are and can help you where you want to go.

Alright, stop. I’m going to cannibalize an old photographer’s saying for the sake of argument here. The best GPS is the one you have with you. Why would I want to carry a netbook when my phone can do what you’re suggesting? Can you imagine walking around downtown with your netbook out? People would wonder if you’d found Zack Morris’ old smartphone.
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