>>Plug in hybrids like the Volt have great marketing hype, and if you keep your trips short, they aren't bad (except for the stupidly high price). The stupidly high price really eliminates any economic practicality unless all trips are electric (read that short and to the next charging outlet).
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>>Toyota is coming out with a plug-in hybrid version of the Prius which again has great marketing hype, but so far the specs don't give me any reason at all why it is better than the regular hybrid Prius aside from being able to drive a few miles (less than 10) battery-only. The price, of course, goes up with the hype.
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>I still don't see why they couldn't be hybrid hybrids from day one. That is, both plug in and gas powered. That'd be the best of both worlds.

I think the reason in the case of the Prius is because the Prius does not have a large capacity battery. It really is only there to supplement the gas engine - kind of a bladder of spare energy. It only takes a couple of minutes of engine time to charge the battery from flat (as low as the computer will let it go) to fully charged.

If the car really had a battery capacity that made extra hardware for AC charging worthwhile then that might be sensible to manufacture.

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>I still think that Toyota didn't want that to do that in the first years of the Prius, because of marketing perception they imagined. Now they'll do it when they perceive a change of wind.

I agree - Toyota sees the wind changing to make plug-in hybrids the current marketing buzz, so they are jumping in (rather weakly IMHO).