They could serve as a case study in how not to do customer service. When you're behind schedule, you cannot afford silence. You have to blog, tweet, Facebook, hire skywriters, anything and everything to tell your customers what's happening and give them a reason to trust you. I don't mind when a project is late. I very much mind when the project gives me the impression that someone absconded to a Caribbean island with my investment.
On a technical level, well: chip and pin. I thought coin was worth $50 when I thought it would be coming out a couple of months after I bought it, so I'd get a good year of use out of it before new card tech rendered it obsolete-by-design. Even if I got one today, my credit union is going to chipped cards in two months. After that date, there is literally no reason I'd personally want to use a Coin.