(sorry for the large quote, I write from my mobile phone)
PA Vita had (and still has) great games that people did not want to pay the price for. No one wanted to pay 50 for killzone (the best mobile fps ever made) for example.
And thats why companies stoped producing AAA games for the system. People could not justify to themselves to pay the premium price for AAA experiences on the go.
Try showing the Nintendo Swift to any of your non gaming friends and their first reaction will be "what kind of tablet is this?, "how much does it cost?", "How much games cost?", "does it have netflix?", "can I play xyz free to play game on it?" etc
Especially if Nintendo decides to sell the tablet and the docking station separately to create a lower entry point for the syste you cannot have the argument that it is a hybrid console.
As for subscriptions model etc just look at their Q&A section in their yearly financial meeting, I think it its clear that they will have subscriptions in the new nintendo unified network:
https://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/library/events/130430qa/index.html
Anyway is still too early, and I think that nintendo has a very difficult winter ahead, because no one will buy a Wii U and I dont remember from E3 any nintendo games releasing in the next two months that will make any impact.