Ok Alan thanks

I think the problem Olympus has at present is that while E-System users are happy with the E-System as a concept, they would like to see it evolve but everyone has his/her idea of what direction it should go. Granted the new concept is 'Micro 4/3rds' not 'Micro E-System' but as it uses the same sensor as the E-System and can use current E-System lenses (how will the AF work on the lenses that can't AF in Live View) it's difficult not to try to consider how it fits into the current range.

It's fairly common on Olympus forums to hear of people who have an E-3 but who've also bought the entry level E-410/420 due to it's compact size (it's something that I thought of doing myself) However they are aware of the limitations present in the E-410/420 and almost all say they want a camera that has the physical size of the 410/420 but with the direct access of the E-3, the build including weather sealing of the E-3 and the V/F and AF of the E-3 even it it means loosing the pop-up flash. I've not yet seen any who want a body smaller than the E-410/420 if it means having the same U/I or a U/I that is even more menu driven. The 3 key areas are V/F, U/I and AF and in that respect the Micro 4/3rds looks as if it will fail to deliver to current E-System users looking for a 'High Spec Compact' as it's likely to have a worse V/F than an E-410, slower AF than a DSLR and less direct controls.

I personally couldn't live with it, my main reason for buying a DSLR in the 1st place was because I'd to all intents and purposes never used anything apart from an SLR and couldn't get on with compacts either film or digital. Just shrink the E-3 and that'll do me. A compact is still a compact whether you can swap lenses or not and whether the sensor is bigger than other compacts or not (a Micro 4/3rds camera still has a smaller sensor than the Sigma DP-1 anyway) and as such it'll have all the other faults that compacts are burdened with.

With that said I could find myself evangelising on the benefits of 'Micro 4/3rds' this time next year.