The next generation of phones/tablets already have HDMI out and bluetooth keyboard support. If people need or want such facilities it'll be faster and easier to get there from phones than laptops.
Uh, even in the west, less than 1% of the population does any real development. Why bump the cost from $80 billion to $200+ billion to give everybody a big power-sucking device that can't be concealed and will do them only limited good over a smartphone?
These are people living off the land in third-world areas. Many are nomads. A communication and educational tool that fits in a pocket can be invaluable. In comparison, a bulky laptop does very little good at this stage in their development.
You make a good point, and this is certainly much better than nothing. I still worry a bit about the long term effects of so many people growing up with only consumption-oriented devies though. In richer countries I think it's less of an issue because people that really want to learn to create digital content can get the tools cheaply enough.
Android runs some scripting languages, so you can code on-the-unit. http://code.google.com/p/android-scripting/ python, lua, beanshell (java scripting), perl and ruby (via JRuby) and some JVM languages.
Although scripting languages tend to be slower, especially on a smartphone and especially on this one (500MHz), they are increasingly mainstream, and the tools are available on the unit. And probably, vastly more powerful than the platforms most of us got started on (ZX81 here).
disclaimer: I don't have an Android, and haven't used these languags, so don't know what limitations they have on a smartphone, nor how serious those limitations are.
