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Kin Twom Verizon and Microsoft are missing a great opportunity

To my mind the Kin Twom is a great feature phone with only two problems that really need correcting. First and foremost contacts need to be able to be saved away from the phone. Kin Studio needs to opened up to the latest Kin phones and not shut down at the end of January. Zune software needs to be modified to save contact information. Verizon needs to make My backup assistant work on the Kin phones. One of these things needs to happen in case your Kin is lost, stolen, etc. and to make moving to a new phone in the future easier.

The second problem with the Kin phone is the inability to organize contacts into some kind of groups. If you have the capability to store 1000 contacts in the phone, you need some way to organize them. Feature phones far less capable than the Kin already have this. How hard can it be to program this feature in.

I recently went looking for a touch phone that I could use without a data plan. It came down to the Pantech Crux, LG Cosmos Touch and the Kin Twom. The Kin Twom was the obvious choice for me. Where else can you get a feature phone with Wifi, touch screen and an 8 megapixel camera with flash and zoom, and music player?

Sure the interface takes some getting used to. But it is miles better than most of the Verizon feature phones. Those interfaces have not changed in years. The Kin is a windows interface (not quite Windows phone 7, but still good). People should stop comparing it to a smart phone. That's not what it is. It lies somewhere between a feature phone and a smart phone.

I also liked the original Kin phones with the social networking features. Some of these features were really unique. I read all the reviews that said the phones failed because the data plan was too expensive. That's not the phone's fault, it is the fault of Verizon marketing. A social networking phone with the ability to save photos and contacts info up in the cloud was really unique in the feature phone market. Both Verizon and Microsoft have really screwed this up. They have a product that could truly impact the feature phone market for years. Frankly there a lot of people who don't want/need a smart phone. Instead those of us with Kins are having the come up with workarounds for the contact problems and watching the unique features of the phone being stripped out by Verizon/Microsoft. Sad

Comments

mcdietz

I give my full support and agree with you 100%. This is by far the best feature phone on the market regardless of carrier. Verizon could really hit it big with this phone if they simply added functionality for backing up contacts. That is really my only major critique for the phone. While the other features mentioned in other threads would be nice, personally I can live without them. As I have been telling all of my family, friends, and coworkers, I am not surprised that the KINs flopped so badly earlier this year as a smartphone. There is no way I would have even considered the phone when compared to the other smartphones out there; it is lacking in some many areas. But I quickly add to that statement by saying that it is the cream of the crop when it comes to feature phones. For me there wasn't even a question or slightest bit of hesitation. The KINs have wifi, great cameras, a touch screen and qwerty keyboard. These phones are great for people who don't want to pay for data plans. I believe that if Verizon and Microsoft just put an ounce of effort into this phone this would be the best selling phone on the market.

dstor

I have posted the same thoughts elsewhere on the boards. You are totally correct. It would take so little effort and this phone could be near perfect for a feature phone. Unfortunately, I do not think Microsoft wants to be in the feature phone business. The just want to get rid of stock. This was such a disaster for them, they are just trying to recoup some loss. Such a great idea, but implemented so poorly from a sales perspective. Mcrosoft was right on the money with the cloud based storage. That's where we are headed with all of our computing, whether it's desktop,laptop,tablet,or other mobile devices like our phones. Web/cloud based computing is the future.

sdowney7171

everyone I taked to said they were shocked Verizon would allow a wifi internet usable phone separate from a data package.

Shocked as in Verizon is money grubbing company and wants you to pay for everything extra to the max price possible. So it is nice that Verizon and MS are allowing these phones to exist. But since this is a money grubbing business for MS and Verizon and these phones are re released failures, get em out there and maybe we can make some money thing, I dont think they care too much about making things much easier for users with these phones. Maybe I am wrong, but Verizon really wants people to keep upgrading changing phones and to get more features like data packages so they can make more money.

At least I was able to take the phone to the Verizon store and get the contacts copied over.

mcdietz

You are exactly right about Verizon trying to shift everybody over to smartphones. They have created the $15 a month data plan for a limited time to ease people into the data plans. They are running the deal right now where smartphones talk free on a family plan, that is no $9.99 per line for new smartphones. They are definitely trying to urge all users to switch over to smartphones. Like so many have said before though, they are missing a huge user group if they forget about feature phones, and that is why this phone is/could be so great.

tom0153

I would also urge Microsoft and Verizon to enhance the features of this phone, particularly, text messaging to groups, and the backup features for contacts.

Thanks for voicing the concerns well, as have others in the entire thread.

Thank you.

rich215

I would be happy if the only upgrade to the software on my Kin Twom was ability to enlarge text and change the gray color in texts to BLACK...... Sydney K was right..... what genius is responsible for programming gray on white in this area of the phone?

It would be a miracle if this phone got any updates/upgrades to its software at this point. I would guess that a newer version of the phone would be the only possible outcome in the future if anything ever comes up. But the phone is pretty good in comparison to any other in the feature phone segment at this time.

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