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If Google PR is based primarily on the number of inbound links, then good, even excellent, small niche sites are doomed to low-PR oblivion.
Each site was only one single page, admitedly a very good widget specific technical page.
This was done deliberately to test the sandbox theory and see exactly how they would rank and appear as well as to prepare them for their full trade widget launch this next month.
Every site is now indexed and displayed with a PR3 and nearly all sites are #1 for the keywords targeted in Google, Yahoo!, MSN, MSN Beta and I've just checked and they're already there at, or near the top, in Gigablast.
Good relevant widget content will get you to the top and stop worrying about PR, most believe this has nothing to do with Google reality any more. I've never bothered about it and just got on with doing my job correctly.