RIP Microsoft KIN, we hardly knew ye
It's kinda sad, really.
But, if we're honest about it, the KIN platform doesn't really fit anywhere. With Windows Phone 7 due to come out later this year, KIN became the red-headed stepchild of their mobile efforts. Did they expect developers to spend their time creating apps for the KIN (teeny tiny potential market) when they can't even get them to develop for their main mobile operating system (which has a slightly larger teeny tiny market)?
KIN had a few cool things going for it. The UI, while not amazing, was new, different and interesting. Kudos to Microsoft for rethinking how a phone should work instead of just reskinning WinMo 6.5.
CAUSE OF DEATH
Personally, what I think really killed it was Verizon's insistence that KIN users have a $30/mo data plan. That means the least you're going to be forking over each month would be $70 (which doesn't include text messaging). That's a chunk of change especially considering the target market of folks in their teens and early 20s.
LEGACY
All (may not) be lost. KIN had a pretty killer feature called KIN Studio. Check out the video below. Hopefully it lives on in some other form.
Really, this should be the kind of thing MobileMe does.
