I miss my Kin One

[Crono]

I know, I know, it sounds weird and improbable that I would miss such a flawed phone - and it certainly was flawed - but it had some things going for it. I especially loved the form factor, as it remains the most comfortable to hold phone I've ever used and with a surprisingly good (though small) slide-out keyboard second only to the Dell Venue Pro (which replaced my Kin One after I lost it). There was something really satisfying, too, about snap-sliding that keyboard out - it just felt really good for some reason. And the phone's body and screen were seemingly indestructible, unlike some phones today which scratch or crack if you look at them wrong. Never even considered getting a case for that phone, not that I'm even sure they made one.

There were similar designs, like the Nokia 7705 Twist, which were also square with physical keyboards, but nothing I've seen since around that time.

Is that size and shape forever gone? I know that current designs are completely going in the opposite direction, but a part of me wants a little smartphone again. The software experience has basically advanced greatly with Project Pink's younger sister, Windows Phone, but with physical keyboards nearly going the way of the dodo, I find it unfortunate that companies are pursuing super large phones with Android and Windows Phone but have given up on smaller phones. I'm very happy with my HTC One (hey, another One!) and the Windows Phones I have owned since the Kin, but I would love to see the rebirth of a Kin-like phone.

Anyone else had a Kin One or Two? Am I crazy?

 

[Lyfer]

Lol when I was a sales rep for Vzw back in the day I sold a crap ton of them because they didn't need a smartphone data plan and were the only feature phone with wifi.

 

[Crono]

Lol when I was a sales rep for Vzw back in the day I sold a crap ton of them because they didn't need a smartphone data plan and were the only feature phone with wifi.

That must have been the later Kin ONEm. I had the original where data was required. It wasn't classified as a feature phone, it was a smartphone at first, which was puzzling since it didn't have an app store and cited as one of the reasons why the phone failed in sales so quickly (virtually zero marketing or awareness of the existence of the device being another - this was pre-Windows Phone in an iPhone, Blackberry, and Android world).

I'm still pissed off at the Verizon store people who refused to give me a free replacement phone which Microsoft/Verizon promised because they killed off Kin Studio. I had the letter and everything, and the Verizon people just shrugged their shoulders and said they never heard of it, even after seeing the news online. I don't know who really owed me the phone, all I know is after spending more than an hour waiting and arguing at the mall, I didn't get squat, and it was too late later on when I did have more time to try again somewhere else.

 

[MrX8503]

The kin is considered one of the worst devices ever created. I would say you're a bit crazy.

 

[Crono]

The kin is considered one of the worst devices ever created. I would say you're a bit crazy.

It had some issues, but it wasn't one of the worst devices ever created.
It was executed poorly in some regards and didn't have a clear future planned out, but even to this day some of its features are refreshingly different in a good way.

Aside from the design, I also liked that it had crazy good battery life. 14 hours in WiFi test, which was much better than even the iPhone 4 at the time. It was also the only phone with Zune music at the time, which was a big deal before Spotify and Google Play Music offered similar subscription options.

Read Brian Klug's review, he was pretty much spot on.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3814/microsofts-kin-a-eulogy

I'm not say the Kin One was a good phone or was for everyone, but it did some things right. Even though Kin Studio failed later because it was killed, it took a while for auto upload and cloud storage/gallery display of photos to be implemented on Android from Google.

 

[notposting]

If I remember right, it ended up taking quite awhile to be released. By that time, Verizon only offered a $30 data plan...it may have done nicely as semi-smart phone for the teens with a $10 or $15 plan, but not full price data.

 

[Commodus]

If I remember right, it ended up taking quite awhile to be released. By that time, Verizon only offered a $30 data plan...it may have done nicely as semi-smart phone for the teens with a $10 or $15 plan, but not full price data.

The Kin series was the classic victim of Microsoft's everything-must-be-Windows culture.

While Microsoft won't say this on the record, the story goes that the ex-Danger team committed a cardinal sin: its original version of the Kin platform used code that was not Windows, and therefore evil incarnate as far as Microsoft was concerned. Andy Lees (then head of the Windows Mobile team) demanded that they scrap their work and build on Windows CE, which not only delayed the Kin past its prime launch window but didn't offer any real benefit.

The company still has that problem today, really. It puts too much value on using Windows code at all costs for integration that isn't all that meaningful; you can't run a Windows Phone app on your Windows 8 PC, and you can't run a Windows 8 app on your Xbox One. One of the reasons Apple has done so well in mobile is because it believes in having interfaces and code that are best for given platforms, not simply consistent for consistency's sake.

 

[gmaster456]

Had a friend who had one. He had a zune and liked it so he ended up with a Kin two.