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Zune Sales Continue to Weaken
Dak RIT writes "Market share data for the first month of Microsoft's Zune sales is now available, and appears to confirm that after the initial hype, sales have fallen off dramatically. Microsoft came in fourth for sales during the month of November with only 1.9% of the market. Apple remained unchanged at 62.2%, and SanDisk even managed to increase to 18.4% (looks like the Zune might not even be able to compete with the rest of the market, let alone the iPod). The one surprise though is that the brown Zune is apparently not only being bought, but more popular than the white model."
I'll be more interested to see how the Zune does after a period of say, six months to a fiscal year. I can't say I'd be surprised one way or the other, but IMHO a month or two of sales data isn't enough for me to see whether a product is effective or not. How does this compare to Ipod's sales its first month?
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You have to wonder what these numbers are really showing. It reads like it's compared to all sizes of mp3 players, from little 256mb flash drives to the 80GB iPod video. I would like to see how it compares to comparable players, instead of overall. Still these numbers are surprising, it's a medium sized player at a good price with a lot of marketing behind it.
I was all anti-Xbox when that thing first came out. In my eyes it was so much worse than the GCN that I couldn't understand purchasing one. PS2 sale numbers owned it hard, and were I a Sony guy I would have been talking the same talk as Apple folks are today. And now the Xbox family is doing just fine, all things considered. Maybe MS will actually turn a profit on those things within the next couple of years. After all, they do know something about running a competitive business, and with consoles they have the experience of trying to break into a market with an already-dominant product out there. Maybe soon enough the Zune will be where the 360 is. And as MS releases new "versions" like the Zune Micro or whatever they feel like calling it, they'll get more competitive. I'm a Creative guy right now anyway. My next player will likely be an Archos. But the Zune/iPod war has only begun if you ask me.
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Well, it used to be the case that Ipod had some *real* technical and usability advantages over their competitors, not just "style" (which is a stupid reason to buy something, IMO). Competition is clearly catching up, and if Apple doesn't makes big innovative updates to the ipod, others will have the chance to do and steal market share from Apple.
The popularity of the iPod is beyond Apple now. Their situation is much like that of Windows. There's nothing particularly great about Windows itself that keeps people using it. What keeps people there is familiarity and the near endless amount software that only runs on Windows. How much money has been spent on accessories that only work with the iPod? Those people are locked in and like Windows, just the fact that something better exists (OSX, Linux) isn't enough to switch.
Let's see. It's larger, heavier, has shorter battery life, is less attractive, has a clumsier interface (no scroll wheel and a less user-friendly menu system), doesn't support podcasts, has a lower storage capacity than the top of the line iPod, almost nonexistant 3rd party peripheral support, doesn't support Audible.com audiobooks, has poorer audio fidelity, only supports the laughable Zune Marketplace for purchasing music online (no podcasts, TV shows, movies, or games), can't be used on a Mac, and doesn't even support Microsoft's own previous DRM schemes.
.mp3 player. Well, for some definition of "fine", anyway.
Additionally the display, while larger, is the same resolution. The software it comes with has quickly developed a reputation for bugginess. Its one potentially cool feature (wireless) is utterly crippled by its implementation, with ridiculous DRM, no way to purchase music wirelessly, and not even the ability to sync with your computer wirelessly.
Finally, while I realize that this is probably a non-issue for most of the Slashdot crowd, the fact remains that the iPod is simply considered cooler within the cultural zeitgeist.
Other than that you're right- the Zune is a fine
Out of curiosity, does anyone out there know if music purchased in the Zune Marketplace can be shared with multiple computers? Purchases from iTMS can be authorized for up to 5 computers. I haven't heard one way or the other how this works for the Zune.
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Anyone who gives a microsoft product "underdog" status should be castrated. There are zillion smaller and more sympatihc mp3 player manufacturers to give your sympathy over (iRiver, Archos, iAudio, ...).
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The IP cartels have forgotten how business works: sell people products that they want at a reasonable price, and people will purchase your product. Yes it is "unfair" that you are competing with "free" pirated competition, but sometimes, you draw a string of bad luck. Those of us in software development are competing against Indian and former Soviet states that might as well be free... Open Source development has expanded from infrastructure to more and more of the software market, and client don't understand the need to do custom work when the free stuff now "almost works as they want."
It's the nature of the market, it destroys people that are standing still. The problem for the IP cartels is that technology used to take decades to eat the market (VHS ate the re-released movie market, but created the home Video market, DVD ate VHS rental commissions, but created the home movie collection), now it takes years. However, if you move fast, you can make money.
Napster made it possible for large swaths of the public to become exposed to non Top 40 music, people traded MP3s around, and it was easy to get a file, but a pain to get a CD, so if you liked it, you bought the CD. Killing Napster opened the market to better P2P solutions. Apple created a pleasant way to buy digital music. The only constant is change.
If I were in charge of the music studios, I'd keep my legal teams on a short leash, harassing P2P enough to push people toward Apple and Microsoft solutions, but not enough to make my customers hate me. I'd use sites like Myspace.com to get my bands out there, and I would crank out new artists. I'd focus less on monetizing my archive with DRM, and sell whatever I can sell. I'd increasing touring, push SA-CD / DVD-A as a higher quality solution. Hit the market everywhere, some stuff will sell, some won't.
However, my biggest change would be my contracting of artists. The current solution, lose money on 9 bands but make a killing on 1, giving everyone giant advances to live like rock stars, playing the celebrity gossip game, etc., isn't working. The one-hit wonder who gets famous flashing the papparazzi is a dead strategy because P2P eats you, but bands with a following make you money. I'd lower advances, increase the artist cut, and get the artists to think like music creators, creating more CDs, and less time playing celebrity. When a band gets discovered, give them money to produce albums, not party it up. There are more music channels (XM, Sirius, HD Radio, etc.), most outlets for videos (Myspace.com, Youtube.com, Google Video, etc.), and more ways to introduce people to music.
Sure, piracy will eat some sales, but it will expose people to more music. Some people may never buy music, but others will if you make it easy. Get product out there, sell what you can, and keep the legal team on enough of an offensive to keep the pirates at bay... however, forget the idea that you can STOP piracy.
Also, STOP making the technology suck. HDMI has proved to be a colossal disaster, it doesn't work right. Havi over Firewire was the easier solution, multiple cables suck (component + firewire or optical audio), but the HDMI situation causes SOOOOO many problems. The technical hurdles affecting your high end customers are killing you. If you want to move discs, get people to WANT higher quality. SA-CD and DVD-A presented a way to make downloaded MP3s of questionable quality less valuable, but you never supported them, and required people to run 6 audio cables because you didn't want digital solutions to take off, WTF!
Stop screwing around, you're missing the fact that pirates attack your low-end, move up market, and just rattle the pirates a bit. You've lost site of your business, and became engrossed with piracy. Put out music people like, and sales will take off... even if the piracy rate hurts somewhat, you can move product. With a minor harassment game, high school and college kids may not buy CDs, but they will after school when they have money, if you have created bands that they love. The market is changes, adapt with it... but in the end, SELL product EVERYWHERE, stop navel gazing and running in fear.
No real biggie there, but I have a lot of live concerts, most all of which span multiple CDs. In foobar2000, I had already had them all tagged accordingly, but for some reason the Zune just didn't recognize the metadata for it. No substitute field, either. It's really annoying to half to skip 2 tracks every track when listening to WEEN live in Minneapolis.
Still, I thought those were both kinda minor, but then I got to using the Zune for the real reason I bought it: lossless. Long story short I goofed up on reading the specs and the Zune doesn't support lossless. It will even try to cap your 320kbs .mp3/.m4a at 192 and convert it to .wma. But here's the question: Why would a device trying to compete--nay overthrow, the iPod limit its capabilities to anything inferior?? The iPod has its own lossless codec, which is quite good.
All those little things have the marks of typical Microsoft goof-ups and they just stare you in the face when you use the Zune and you hate it more and more.
You were critically hit for no damage. The bruise will look nice, and maybe the scars will make good party talk.