I'm up for the challenge.
I don't think the phone has failed...yet. I seriously hope to hell it doesn't fail. I was honestly hoping that the Nexus One would sell 250,000 in the first week, because that's going to do nothing but HELP all of us Android users. The Market would/will explode with apps and the mobile race gets that much more interesting. I honestly don't think it's a ridiculous claim at all. I'm an Android owner and fan myself, so I'm not on the other team, per se.
I don't think that the Nexus One will end up a failure. Google has too much riding on it and it's an easy fix to prevent the failure. The reason I think that the possibility of it being a failure and hurting Android is a valid one, is that for weeks, one of the only things being talked about in the tech world was the "Google Phone". Everyone not living under a rock has surely heard about it in one form or another, whether it be from the news, the newspaper, the web, etc. Google, trying an interesting marketing approach, is only advertising via the web and word of mouth. Additionally, the only way you can currently order this phone is through their website. This is easily going to lose more than a few sales. To the outsider (in this case, not a phone/tech geek/junkie who comes on forums such as these), it kind of makes the phone an afterthought if not too many people own them. This could, again to the outsider, shed an unfavorable light on the OS. Uninformed people could think, "hey, this phone was supposed to be the be-all-end-all and it isn't selling any units. Either the phone is garbage or the whole Android thing is bogus". I'm not saying this is what WILL happen, I'm just saying it COULD happen. You do have to remember that not everyone comes on these forums and will truly appreciate what the device(s) can do.
And as far as any other contribution to the thread, I just thought I'd add my two cents in as to my experiences with Apple products.