End of an Era (and an Error)

I'm definitely not tearing up over the announcement that Microsoft is killing the Kin after four months on the market (and I've got to assume that the rumors that only 500 devices sold during that span of time can't be true). But the word that the Sidekick line is being officially discontinued compels me to pause for reflection. Yes, Danger's been owned by Microsoft for a few years now and has pretty much done nothing worth mentioning (in that I'm not going to mention the Kin again), but the old-school Sidekicks were great phones. Not particularly well made phones—in my 5 years as a Sidekick user, I probably went through 4 warranty replacements on the SK1 and 3 on the SK2—but great for their time.

The keyboard was a masterpiece, and I could easily touch type on it while walking down the street. Many of the early 34 entries were compose on it. I guess many folks feel the same way about their Blackberry keyboards, but they never did it for me (plus I had a weird corporate Blackberry with a compressed keyboard). The G1's keyboard should have been as good, but a poorly placed ridge in the trackball area really killed its usefulness.

Speaking of the G1, I suppose it's Android, and not the Kin, that is the true heir to the Sidekick legacy, with Andy Rubin's influence and all. I've been a happy Nexus One user since December, and I'll hopefully find some time to write about my Android experience soon enough.

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