TightWind is written by Kyle Baxter. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Engadget has a good set of Microsoft Kin UI walkthrough videos. (Ignore the voiceover.)

I’m not sure what Microsoft is thinking here. With Windows Mobile 7, they had a chance to create a single mobile OS to develop. But these Kin devices use a completely different OS that’s closer to a feature phone than smart phone. The two OSes have different philosophies. Why fragment your offerings so much? Why confuse customers with two separate platforms?

In any case, watching these videos makes my head hurt. I clearly am not the phone’s target customer, because the last thing I want or need is a phone that makes “social” sites like Facebook the center of my life. I don’t want to share everything I do with the web, and I definitely do not want to see what everyone else is doing all of the time.

I suppose I might be reaching the point where I’m out of touch with what the next generation wants to do. I don’t see “sharing” everything I do in status updates and photos on Facebook or other sites as worth my time. I would rather be doing something productive–reading, writing–something that creates value for me or others. Reading what everyone else is up to is a waste of time at best.

I don’t follow people on Twitter because I want to know what they’re doing at any given moment (although with some people, that’s occasionally interesting). I follow them because they’re contributing something, somehow, and I want to see what they’re working on, or what they’re interested in. This is useful to me–I’ve learned about a lot of great things I wouldn’t otherwise be exposed to through people I follow on Twitter. But beyond instant gratification and entertainment, what is the value of using Facebook or Twitter in the way the Kin is made for?

I don’t think there’s any value. Instead, it’s fostering a culture of cheap thrills and entertainment. Or, rather, it’s made for that culture.