It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Kinect to Cry

And the list of supposed Kinect features grows smaller and smaller.

The cruel irony is that Microsoft is including the 2009 E3 promotional video on the Xbox 360.  I see it all the time at Target's demo station.  Customers are going to expect all these amazing abilities that Kinect simply cannot perform.  No four-player or voice control or sitting on the couch.  No scanning your skateboard or trying out new outfits.  And no creepy friendships with Milo.  But you can wave your arms slowly to catch volleyballs in a very basic motor-skills game!  Wow!

Make no mistake, dear readers.  Kinect is not ready for launch, and Microsoft knows this.  It's nowhere even close to competing with Nintendo.  But the investors are glaring and time grows short, and the company is desperate to show they are advancing with exciting, new technology to win over the Expanded Audience.  It will not work.  This overpriced, lobotomized camera will fail, and its ignoble death may spell the end of the Steve Ballmer era, and the end of the Xbox.