The Short-Lived Life Of Microsoft Kin: What Went Wrong – SlashGear

At launch, the smaller Kin One was advertised at $50 while the larger Kin Two cost $100. A few weeks later those prices were slashed to $29 and $49, respectively. Not too bad, right? But there was a catch. 

In order to realize these advertised prices, buyers had to jump through a few hoops. The amount paid at point-of-sale was actually $150 for Kin One or $200 for Kin Two. The buyer could then apply for a $100 rebate that was received in the form of a debit card. In other words, a cumbersome process that involved shelling out additional cash upfront and waiting for a rebate, assuming that the rebate paperwork was submitted properly, or at all. 

Price gimmicks notwithstanding, what really helped sink the Kins was a mandatory two-year contract with Verizon Wireless at a lofty price of $70 per month for voice and data combined, which is equivalent to $96 per month in today’s dollars. That’s a lot of money for a student — who perhaps has a part-time job flipping burgers — to fork over to a cellphone company every month. Yet, such a person was precisely Kin’s target demographic.

[Featured image by Evan-Amos via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | Public Domain]