Small/light laptops are not netbooks

The point of netbooks is to provide something that at the higher end may be of similar size/weight to an ultra-portable laptop, but provides "just enough" to get the job done for most people, at a MUCH lower cost - this means a slower single-core CPU, less RAM, less screen resolution, and often a much smaller screen. Part of this is enabled by dumping Windows XP for Linux, though the vendors are re-introducing this as they improve the specs. Another part is the rise of web applications and Software as a Service (SaaS) - as someone said, a netbook is a "life support system for a web browser" though of course it can run local apps too (even 3D games in some cases).

A portable system costing $899 with the specs mentioned simply isn't a netbook - it's a very nice laptop if that's what you need, but it's filling a different niche. Given that ultraportable laptops have always been expensive and slow sellers compared to netbooks, it's fair to say that the netbook is addressing a much larger market.