Zune: Dead On Arrival

Zune is just another example of Microsoft stupidly trying to widen it's war-on-all-fronts-against-all-comers while avoiding getting its house in order. The hubris and arrogance of Microsoft's executives is astonishing. They really believe they can attack an entrenched super-dominant solution like iPod/iTunes, and simply throw Microsoft brand and dollars at it, or maybe they think we are stupid:

[from Brown Is Not the new White by Stephen Wildstrom]

Zune hit number 2 in retail sales among music players during its first week on the market, according to data compiled by market researcher NPD, but fell back to #5 in the week ended Nov. 25. Data from Amazon.com suggest a bleaker picture. On Dec. 9, the black Zune (Amazon counts each stock keeping unit, or SKU, as a separate product) was the 60th most popular consumer electronics item with Amazon customers. That's a good performance only in comparison with the brown Zune, which ranked 292nd, and the white model at 423rd, suggesting that if you want to sell a white music player, it had better be an iPod.

The best selling Zune was outsold not only by 13 iPod models (which accounted for 4 of the 5 most popular consumer electronics items) but by five non-Apple music players. The SanDisk Sansa M240 was the hottest of the un-iPods at #6.

The war for your living room is coming, and I am still betting on Apple -- not Microsoft, not Sony, not Hollywood -- to figure out the right combination of features and adaptors (vis-a-vis Mark Cuban's recent predictions about the conventional entertainment media beating internet-based solutions). The iPod is the best predictor of what collection of gadgetry is needed to pull this all together: building portable devices that can connect to the internet, and plug into display devices (like HDTV and LCD displays).

Televisions will be as dead as typewriters in a few years: they will go from ubiquitous to non-existent, just as soon as the value chain for internet-based video snaps into place.

tags: television, zune, ipod, apple, microsoft, mark+cuban, stephen+wildstrom, the+battle+for+the+living+room

Comments

[David]

You have to consider however:

1) Real Player v. MS Media Player
2) Netscape v. IE
3) Palm OS v. Windows Mobile

Thing is, MSFT has been very successful launching crappy products, using cash flow from other business units, and reiterating until an 'ok' version is created. While usually this is created years later, its usually tied in with Windows and/or MS Office that it can blow the competition out of the water.

[Avatar]

ditto what david said, and you still have to remeber who is the man they put as head of the entertaiment & digital devices division..

J. Allard.

Xbox360 will begin winning money next year after losing money in the first generation with the very possible scenerario that MS will be #1 for the 256 bits generation consoles.

And that Xbox360 is going to push digital ditribution models to tv´s everywhere in a way that by price and convenience will look a tat better than using netflix..

And for those torrenting, they now will be able to stream away to the TVs for all the family thanks to it..

So, if it took them 7 years to do that in gaming from ZERO, i can predict that a cemented #2 will be archived at the first year of the Zune and in 3 years the zune will be at the same level of market share or over ipod marketshare, simply becuase they are only competing with the ipod..

The angle you really overlook stowe is that MS launch in a more and more global way, and Apple can´t top that, just here in Mexico a zune costs the same that in the usa(11 per dollar plus taxes of course), a ipod cost 50% more (plus taxes). in some places the ipod cost double from what a Zune costs.. there you have it.. just by price Zune is more atractive outside the USA than a ipod.

And THAT is where this sort f predictions fall short, The world is not just USA Stowe. you are bengin extremely localist in your perspectives.

[Tyler]

Well in Canada the Ipod isn't 50% more, so you're being localistic too just because of how things are in Mexico. I don't know how right thi s is to say but why bother for a market like Mexico when you could dominate the most important market in the world, the states, that's where the money is, and money is what they all want.