New DSi = new iPhone for kids?

That's what the Youth Trends research firm's calling this third version of Nintendo's handheld game player. "The $170 DSi fully embraces the two biggest trends in gaming: customization/personalization and multi-player interactivity," writes its Gen Digital blogger. By customization, the blog's referring to all the little features that are putting the new DSi in competition with the iPod Touch - 2 easy-to-use built-in 0.3 megapixel cameras, photo editing, game downloading, music recording, wi-fi, and Web browsing - features that I think do make the DSi (with its 850 games to choose from and not so many to download yet) just that much more attractive to young gamers. Interestingly, with this device, Nintendo's targeting "women, adults, and non-gamers," according to Wall Street Journal blogger Courtney Banks, but her review makes it sound like those users would much prefer the iPod Touch's better Web and photo-sharing functionality (browsing on the DSi is very slow, she couldn't play video, and "any time I attempted to load Gmail I was greeted with an "insufficient memory error" message).