What will Sun’s iPod be? the NY Times asks today in its article reporting Jonathan Schwartz’s ascension to the top seat at Sun.

That’s easy: Make Internet Tablets.

License what is needed from Nokia, or partner with them. Run Linux or run Solaris, who cares? And make them in more than one size.

Then push the idea proselytized by Remote User (aka Gene Mosher) of the device as a window on a more powerful computer, where you really run your software.

I guess this is the idea of the diskless computer that was temporarily popular a few years back, but that seems mostly to have been an anti-Microsoft effort. This one will work, because you’re untethering the computer.

The 770 is meant to access the web. (OK, it does many other wonderful things.)

But think about it from the remote control perspective. I want a bigger screen for accessing my desktop. I want maybe 5.5 inches width and 1024 pixels. I’m thinking of this Sun tablet as more a business device than the 770, so I don’t worry about it being larger. Still has to weigh little. Still needs fast, no-cost, open-source OS. No disk drive needed (for obvious reasons). Is more RAM useful in this context?

And low, low cost. Not $1,200 like the first Windows-based UMPC. More like the cost of an iPod.

The point is to sell so many of them so fast that the demand for Sun’s current lines goes up. Oh, sure, that was the idea of the iPod too, that it would feed sales of the Mac and that hasn’t happened. But if you’re going to control a computer remotely, you want it to be optimized for that. And if you’re going to have a lot of people doing this at the same time . . .

Hey, maybe it makes more sense to give these tablets away to sell the bigger devices and service.

Probably, as a consequence of being business-y, I’d package a keyboard with this device, or what some people call a thumb-board. I haven’t used one of these, but as an add-on it makes real sense — only buy one if you’re willing to deal with the added bulk and weight. And need it badly.

I’d also push WiFi clouds heavily in urban areas. You need that to make the walkaround web work for business. I mean, how much of your business occurs away from your desk and even away from an outlet? Must be a lot. How about exploiting that, Jonathan?

I guess I should add that these tablets benefit greatly from the notion of running apps from a website. But I don’t suggest that that is what makes the device appealing to a company like Sun — much more important would be controlling your own apps from your own server or desktop.

Can Sun do this better than Nokia? I don’t know. But I think they could put a lot more people on the project and use this as a way of building their core business, and promoting their open-source OS, in a more direct fashion than Nokia. And if ever there was a way of realizing the vision that “the network is the computer,” wow this is it.