Reggie posted the news that in the 2005 Engadget Awards, the Nokia 770 won both the Reader’s Choice as the 2005 Handheld of the Year, and the Editor’s Pick.

Wow! Congratulations to everyone at Nokia! I can mention Janne Jormalainen, Ari Virtanen and Ari Jaaksi by name because they’re upper-enough management for their names to be known, but we know a lot of people made this happen. They all deserve our appreciation and thanks, and this award provides us an opportunity to give them that. Thanks, you guys!

Lots of things go into this. First of all, with as much as they bit off, the people at Nokia were able to get the 770 delivered in 2005. Look at Microsoft, which is hoping to get an “ultra-mobile” with comparable abilities delivered in 2007 for about three times the price of the 770. Or Sony, hoping to deliver a 2-bit 1-color e-reader without WiFi or additional apps, removing the pricetag from their website this week because they can’t meet their same-as-the-770 price. Or the PepperPad, bigger, heavier, fewer apps, twice the price.

Second, Nokia looked at the Bermuda Triangle of web pads and didn’t flinch when setting off to build its own internet tablet. Requirements: Must be super small so people will carry it — pocket size, in fact. Must fully access the web, which means at least 800 pixels wide (oops, that makes requirement 1 really hard) and WiFi. Must be affordable (oops, that directly conflicts requirements 1 and 2).

Third, for all the breadth of its capabilities, the 770 doesn’t try to do everything. It doesn’t include a phone. No camera. No keyboard or disk drive either. You don’t need those things for what it does. Nokia stayed focused on what it was trying to do and didn’t yield to the more-is-better delusion, like for instance, the OQO.

Fourth, Nokia didn’t try to partition off the 770 but instead placed it squarely in among the Linux/open-source community. Was this a separate goal or the lucky consequence of the requirements above? I don’t know. But either way, belonging to the community instead of profiting from the community made things signficantly different in helping the 770 succeed where others had wrecked.

Yes, we’re enthusiasts here at itT, and we’re happy the object of our fascination has won. It means that others can see this remarkable confluence of capabilities and recognize what it is too: a handheld worth celebrating.