When you’re very late to the party, not too many people notice your arrival. I mean, a couple of wallflowers might notice you coming through the door, but most of the kids are already busting their moves on the dance floor.
The Zune was late to the party, and no one noticed it. Now it’s dead, and if we had to hazard a guess, few people probably noticed that too.
Microsoft has killed off the Zune according to Business Insider. Well, not entirely—the Zune player itself is gone, but Microsoft is now focusing their music playing effort into Windows Phone 7. We can’t argue with that move. When you think about it, the era of the dedicated media player is coming to an end. I know we’ll probably get some slack from the iPod classic crowd for that comment, but we honestly believe that the time for a dedicated music device is over.
The bizarre thing about Microsoft’s move is that they’re planning on selling the current Zune to customers, but they won’t be introducing new ones. Something tells me that people won’t be willing to buy an end of the line product if given the chance.
It looks like the Zune versus iPod war is now officially over, and the Windows Phone 7 versus iPhone war is in full swing. We’ll take it. Personally, if I had to do away with my iPhone, I’d be rocking a Windows Phone 7.
Editor’s Note: If anyone knows that Zune guy in the picture above, you may want to pop over for a visit tonight. Something tells me he might be taking this news particularly hard.
Article Via Business Insider
FLICKR
YOUTUBE
RSS
I have a Zune. It was purchased back in 2006 and the best feature in my opinion was WiFi sync. You never had to dock it. Now Zune will become a service for the Win7 phones and XBOX Live.
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
Likehahaha! Oh boy. Didn't know that.
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
LikeI think you mean 'flack', not 'slack'.
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
LikePlenty of links to tattoo guy.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&biw=1366&bih=643&q=zune+tattoo+guy&aq=1&aqi=g2g-v8&aql=&oq=zune+tatt
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
LikeI don't know what MS was thinking with the Zune, when they had the market cornered with Windows Media Player (WMP). Why not have a piece of hardware that synchronizes with the damn device on 90% of computers?
Requiring a Zane interface, and making it completely incompatible with the WPM, - in addition to requiring a large amount of system resources to run the Zune bloat-ware was a foolish idea.
I remember Gates saying to Jobs, they were not even getting into the music market at all, and they were going to focus on phones. Bill said, "he doesn't believe in stand alone mp3 players. And listening to music on your phone was the best move." This was years before the Zune came out.
What is going on at that company?
And the terminology was terrible. "Squirting" people songs. Lame and borderline disturbing.
[And I run Win 7]
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
LikeWhat's zune?
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
LikeI absolutely agree with you.
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
LikeSince I'm too cheap to shell out for a data plan, my main use for a smartphone is as a media player. I will never buy another standalone music player, but I was happy to hear that the fairly well-received UI of the Zune will live on in WP7. Maybe one day I'll even get around to trying it out. ;-)
Point being: you're absolutely right... dropping the standalone and focusing on the phone feature is smart.
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
LikeDouchey article. If you ever tried a Zune HD, you'd realize it deserves more respect than this.
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
LikeI absolutely agree with you.
- spam
- offensive
- disagree
- off topic
Like