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Critical Review of the Zune
ceallaigh writes "Andy Ihnatko of the Chicago Sun-Times has a critical review of the Zune. "Avoid," is my general message. The Zune is a square wheel, a product that's so absurd and so obviously immune to success that it evokes something akin to a sense of pity."
Inknato is an Apple fanboy - that's what this is about.
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Who takes anyone like that seriously? Only other Apple fanboys. Jeez, Inknato isn't even a fanboy he's a fangirl with a silly hat, the big girl's blouse.
These people sold their integrity out, and no intelligent person cares *what* they say when the Apple brand is involved.
The *genuine* point against the Zune that anyone should make is that it's crippled with DRM. Otherwise, it's very nice: nice big screen - better than Apple's tiddly pissy iPod screen - nice UI, and it's got WiFi. But the DRM kills the thing.
Here's a critical - good but critical - review:
http://playlistmag.com/news/2006/11/24/zune/index
Says it all. Inknato couldn't hope to write anything as worth reading.
I've used an iPod. I have a Zune. They're both fine players. I had no problem setting up the Zune software on three different machines, I have had no trouble with the player or downloading music to it, and I love the built in FM stereo (why couldn't the iPod have had this years ago?)
If the iPod and iTunes were to come out today, I really wonder what this journalist would have to say about them.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is insufficiently documented.
"...completely incompatible with previous Microsoft music standards..."
Actually, incompatible with only one.
"...has none of the features that make the iPod so completely useful..."
None? It doesn't play music or video? I think that's what people buy iPods for, not the stupid organizer or firewire boot. Ever boot a windows machine off an iPod? How does firewire boot work on current iPods that don't support firewire?
"...forcing users to rely on the Zune application to move data onto or off the device is infuriating..."
You mean just like the iPod requires iTunes?
"...and it's obsequious pandering to the music industry..."
How is Microsoft pandering to the music industry any more than Apple does?
"...rather than putting the effort into making a better product to the iPod quite simply offends."
It quite offends you that Microsoft would implement DRM just as Apple does in order to gain support from the music industry? Does Apple "quite offend" you equally?
"If Microsoft *really* was interested in making a better product and not acting as a pimp for the record industry, they would also not have relied on "Zune Points" to purchase music."
What does Zune points have to do with the music industry? Nothing.
"As anybody who has ever taken Marketing101 knows, you should always facilitate the process of getting people to spend money on your products and anything that steps in-between or slows this process down had better have a damn good reason for existing. Why do I have to buy "Zune Points" to then make music purchases? It's just stupid."
So your argument boils down to an absurd rant about MS's dumb but ultimately unimportant Zune currency? For those who don't want to purchase DRM'ed music, Zune points aren't involved at all. If you were so concerned with pandering to the interests of the music industry, you wouldn't care one bit about how music you'll never buy is purchased.
"Oh, and Microsoft..... Just a suggestion: Very few end users want their products to "squirt" anything at them. That is just bad marketing."
Somehow I doubt you're intent on offering Microsoft any useful advice.
What a surprise that the most negative review of the Zune that anybody could find would be posted on Slashdot.
I guess we'll just ignore the many, many more moderate reviews that rate the Zune as good, but no iPod killer. After all, we wouldn't want to represent the general consensus.
I could just as easily post very positive reviews of the Zune, but I guarantee those will never been seen on Slashdot's front page.
If I recall, virtually everybody dismissed Microsoft's entry into the game console market in much the same way. People criticized the Xbox as being inferior to the PS2, although in general they gave more credit to the Xbox than they're giving to the Zune. (Perhaps because the iPod fans have a bit more zealotry in their blood than the Sony fans.)
But as we learned from the Xbox360, which according to almost everybody is the tentative winner of the next gen console wars, Microsoft often uses the first release of a product as a test bed for their eventual successful strategy.
I suspect we'll look back in a few years as see the Zune as a predecessor of the device that finally kills the iPod.