Follow your muse, Microsoft--get out of hardware
About a year ago, I blogged about a study conducted by Yahoo researcher Duncan Watts showing that there's almost no link between quality and popularity in music.
In that study, if subjects could see how other subjects were voting on a particular song, they tended to vote the same way. Each song's popularity had almost no correlation with "objective" quality, as measured by a control group who voted based on ears alone.
The Zune never felt like a labor of love.
(Credit: Microsoft)Music industry blogger Bob Lefsetz took this point a bit further the other day in a post advising young musicians that they shouldn't pin their hopes on the traditional gatekeepers of the music business--the record labels, radio programmers, and so on--because these folks are interested only in what they can sell, not what's good.
Lefsetz wasn't exactly advising kids to sell out; he was warning them that if they follow their muse, they shouldn't expect success. Heck, calculated commercialism seems to have worked out fine for Billy Joel.
This drew a response from legendary producer Bob Ezrin, who produced Pink Floyd's The Wall, Lou Reed's Berlin, and a lot of Alice Cooper's albums. He argues that fledgling musicians have to follow their muse, not only because it's the only way to lasting success, but because most young musicians don't have enough mastery to aim for a particular genre or market, anyway.
As Ezrin put it, "No one is born a hack. Hacks are failed or jaded artists, each and every one." (Case in point: Jane's Addiction's last album, Strays, recorded a decade after the band's heyday, minus the essential sound provided by original bassist Eric Avery, and produced by...Bob Ezrin.)
Here's how I'd break it down. Making a decent living--much less making millions of dollars--as a pop musician has about the same odds as becoming an NFL football player. If you follow your muse and fail, at least you've had fun and can look back with pride. If you try to sell out and fail, you're left with nothing.
Which brings me, in however so roundabout a way, to the poor, nearly departed Zune. I'm sorry to see that Cesar Menendez, who was in charge of Microsoft's Zune Insider blog, was included in the company's recent layoffs. I know that there are many passionate music fans working on the Zune team, not least of all Kyle Hopkins, aka DJ Kid Hops, who produces not one, but two, consistently amazing shows on Seattle community radio station KEXP.
But overall, I agree with fellow CNET network blogger Matt Asay: the Zune initiative always had a "me too" feel, as if somebody high in the ranks at Microsoft decided that the company needed an answer to the iPod for business and strategic reasons, but didn't have any particular passion for music, or MP3 players, or even hardware. Everybody saw through it, right from the beginning.
As CNET News' Ina Fried uncovered, Zune revenue over the holiday quarter was anemic. If you run the numbers, it looks as if the company earned $85 million from the Zune in the December quarter.
Given an average price per unit of about $150, that means that Microsoft sold a little more than half a million units. And that was in the peak quarter. Compare that with 22.7 million iPods, and it smells an awful lot like failure to me.
Microsoft's passion is software, not hardware. It's time for Microsoft to follow its muse and get out of the hardware business.
Matt Rosoff is an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, where he covers Microsoft's consumer products and corporate news. He's written about the technology industry since 1995, and reviewed the first Rio MP3 player for CNET.com in 1998. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mattrosoff. 
Zune has some great things going for it. If it were Mac-compatible, I'd be very willing to give it a shot, since I love the idea of being able to subscribe to music and keep 10 songs per month. The reason: I just deleted about 2 gigabytes of music from my iTunes collection that I realized that I haven't listened to in years - and never had the interest to listen to. I was also hoping to have wifi in iPod Nanos. Without devices like Zune pushing at Apple's door to do so, I doubt they ever will. (Just think how killer the Zune's song sharing feature would be on an iPod.)
Oh, well... I hope the Zune sticks around. Sansa's good and has good marketshare, but I can't imagine the device growing much more than it already has. Sansa just seems to be in the space because they can. At least the Zune team seems to have some passion about music.
I will agree with you that Sandisk has a pretty good product going with their Sansa. With the decline of DRM on iTunes one can purchase virtually any of the tracks on iTunes now and put them on your player of choice so the whole iTunes advantage has vaporized. With the exception of there being a better selection of accessories for ipods there isn't much going for buying an ipod anymore especially for those not interested in the ipod touch. For the low end market Apple's products typically cost more, but don't offer any compelling advantages. Buying one of Apple's low end models is a bit like buying a luxury brand car that doesn't have a high performance engine, leather seats or a high end stereo system. You are essentially paying a premium, but not getting much to show for it.
I differ with the notion that Sandisk can't compete with Apple. Sandisk is making some very compelling low end players at very competitive price points. Now that Apple has removed DRM from most of their iTunes tracks they have unbundled the benefits of the iTunes library from the iPod. If you like iTunes you can now buy music from iTunes, but not have to use it with an iPod. In our poor economy I have a feeling that we are going to see a lot of people who are going to stop and consider what benefits an iPod has over a Sansa and they are going to find that beyond a perceived chic factor there isn't much going for the iPod anymore.
The XBox is hardly a throwaway. But the Zune---who worries about it anyway?
I wouldn't see why Microsoft would get out of the business of selling mice and keyboards. It has been a fairly profitable business for them.
(For mice, I'll keep my Razer Diamondback, thanks much. :) ).
Zune *isn't* a "me too" device that copies Apple:
Wireless song sharing was a cool idea, but the record labels wrecked it by making it too restrictive.
Zune wasn't the first to offer a subscription music service, but it's a good feature that Apple doesn't offer.
I like Zune, but there's something missing
MS needs to take the concepts of Zune and unify them, right now Zune feels like a bu
I don?t doubt that many or even most Zune owners are satisfied with what they have. Here?s my thing: Apple dove into the MP3 market when that market was already well on its way to maturity. The iPod quickly made a big splash, and iTunes has played no small part in helping the iPod acquire a 70% market share. Apple did not engage in illegal, monopolistic business practices in order to achieve that level of prominence; nor did Steve Jobs hypnotize buyers, steering them towards the iPod.
When the iPod was released in October of 2001, it succeeded during a recession caused by the terrorist attacks of 9/11. If the current economic climate adversely affected the Zune and other consumer products, then it stands to reason that it also adversely affected iPod sales. Yet, Apple reported a growth in iPod sales for the most recent quarter, versus a 54% drop in Zune revenues. How much better would the iPod have faired this quarter without the deepening recession?
I believe that Microsoft and its investors need to re-evaluate the Zune with regard to how it affects other products, and how it affects shareholder interests. If I?m a Microsoft competitor ? and I don?t believe that Apple and Microsoft compete in the sense that they appeal to very different groups of customers ? then I truly hope that Microsoft continues to throw money and other resources at the Zune. Let them and their investors learn the hard way. Again.
If anything, they need to make their software for the Zune better. One big reason people go ipod is because of itunes.
As others have mentioned, Microsoft produces great hardware in the computer input space (keyboards, mice, gamepads) and while the Xbox 360 has had some well known quality assurance troubles, I certainly would hate to see Microsoft get out of the console hardware business since the "total package" the 360 is a piece of (Xbox Live, the game ecosystem the 360 has built up, etc) is fantastic and the new revisions of the 360 hardware are much improved on the quality front.
BTW, what can make Zune really take off... Well if it finds the sweet spot of being a MP3 player, Video player and a hand held gaming system (borrowing XBOX roots) then they got a good shot in kicking iPod's, PSP and Nintendo DS... Microsoft are you listening...
You mean like an iPod Touch does right now?
That's awesome
You mean like an iPod Touch does right now?
Yeah, except the iPod Touch doesn't have an FM tuner (which I i really like about the Zune, and pretty much every other player has nowadays).
The Zune had many many issues, not the least of which was the software, which had to be completely rewritten after version 1.0. Then there was the playforsure debacle, where everyone who was renting their music one morning woke up to find out it was no more (thus giving a prime example of why you should own your music). Then there is the issue with how thick the Zune HDD models are, embarassingly thick. Then there is the issue with wifi, why have it just to swap songs that can only be played how many times? Good use of space in the player microsoft. Had to find something to have it stand apart and this was it? This all makes sense when you learn that the Zune was thrown together with off the shelf parts, and the software was also thrown together. It's like Microsoft to release a product using the brand name to help sell it, even though it is a piece of junk. The Zune is failing for good reason. The techies should stop hating everything mainstream, drop the prejudice, and see that Apple is producing some really nice products.
"Microsoft's passion is software, not hardware. It's time for Microsoft to follow its muse and get out of the hardware business."
You say "passion" for the way Microsoft insist in producing crappy software?
I think --as others had posted-- that the only "good" products from MS are keyboards and mice... OK, Flight Simulator too.
All the rest, crap! (I include Vista here)
This tiny tiny device does everything it's suppose to do - and it has a built in FM radio, and WiFi. Now sure - the iTouch & iPhone have Wifi, but outside those 2 models - no other iPod has those features. No other iPod can access it's store over WiFi... or listen to the radio and click-add the music from the store (Zune Pass required of course).
I subscribe to podcasts (video & audio), and when I walk into my home I just tell the Zune to do a wireless sync, and like IT magic - the device syncs up. I got a Photo directory that I share over the Mesh with friends & relatives, and I have my Zune software watching it... Those too WiFi sync just like the podcasts.
The Zune supports more codecs (last time I checked). The 4Gb flash models are only $99, and have a full color screen. Not much more than those clothespin screenless ipods.
The problem is that the press keeps beating the sheet out of the Zune, and consumers are left with this unjustified sense that it's all going to be over soon... Even when the Zune first came out it was like that - and years later nothing has changed.
I hope MS continues with the software upgrades, which incorporate more and more. I'd like to see it worked more gracefully into the XBOX (and XBL & Marketplace).
I have an iTouch. Without enough free WiFi it got old, which I understand isn't a problem with the iPhone... But for what the Zune was made for doing (playing videos, music, looking at photos) - it really does surpass so much of the mp3 player market in features.
Now if you want to compare your iTouch/iPhone to my decked out media-PC, with built in bluetooth-2-SIP, HDTV playback on my 42" monitor I'm ready to go... Fact is unless you compare apples to apples and oranges to oranges, even your iPhone lacks... Compare the Zune to others in it's class - and it's far superior.
As for all the ipod users... Lemmons.
- by Jayemmbee January 30, 2009 9:06 AM PST
- everyone hates on the zune just like vista and just like vista im sure no one has used a zune, i have both zune and vista and they are both great, just bad hype and just got hammered by apple sheep,
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(30 Comments)but really what both platforms need is agressive advertising and support for the zune outside of north america, support macs, and in canada give us zune marketplace. but i love it i just wish more people had one so i could use the social better, and that 3rd parties would support accessories like docks etc.