The glossy displays on the MacBook pros are actually not that bad. They ramp up to such a high brightness that you can defeat any glare you throw at it.
I've used my macbook pro in the full midday sun on my back with no problem. The matte screen on my 15" powerbook was pretty much unusable outside unless it was dark.
I think this is likely more due to the change to LED for back lighting.
What the problem is with glossy displays is that they act like a half-silvered piece of glass. If the brightness on the outside gets too high, they turn into a mirror and it's near impossible to see through. However if the brightness remains high on the inside, you can see through with perfect clarity.
So long as the back lighting can get brighter than the fore lighting, the glossy screen can be amazing. It has a few problems, like glares (where reflections and such cause light levels to peak higher than the back light), however these are really only a problem if you have to max out your back light.
Apple should be designing their laptop screens like they do their iPod screens. My brightness on my iPod is set to ~0% and inside it is perfect, even for most tv shows (no dark moody movies though), and outside I rarely need to put it up to 100% on the sunniest of days. This would be the ideal, but until laptops actually become ultra-portable I don't think this is a huge concern.
I think it's a trend of the new-geek to want to be outside in nature when working, so hopefully some ultra-powerful back lights are going to be available on high-end laptops for use outside.
I've used my macbook pro in the full midday sun on my back with no problem. The matte screen on my 15" powerbook was pretty much unusable outside unless it was dark.