Ah, what's in a name? Without going too far into analyzing how phones are named (which really deserves a thorough analysis, since clearly a lot effort goes into it, with mixed results), the Eternity is interesting for the period it represents: released in mid-2008, it's a direct reaction to the iPhone. I wouldn't be surprised if it was rushed into design less than a year after its release, when it was clear that the iPhone's introduction was a major event. Reading and watching a CNET review from the time of its introduction, it's interesting to see that it was perceived as a medium-end business phone, and as much as the special AT&T features (TV and music) were touted, it didn't seem that that was the core point of interest for most people. That puts this phone into an interesting position: it's a slate, like the iPhone, but its design predates the App Store, so it's still tied to the old model where carriers provide functionality, which means that as an experience, it's limited to what's built into the OS and what the carrier has provided. A couple of months before its introduction in October 2008, Apple released the App Store, which represented the second giant wave of innovation in that space, and which swept the carrier-centric view of phones away, likely forever. By the time the phone was released, the App Store was exploring and exploiting the capabilities of devices like this much more than any single manufacturer or carrier could ever hope to.
