Zune phone ad campaign coming?
I was vacationing last week, so I missed my chance to comment on the Zune HD rumors. Microsoft had already told me that it is planning one more iteration of the Zune hardware, and given the iPhone's success, it wouldn't surprise me if it has a touch screen (though I was hoping for something more cutting-edge, like a projector).
Now it appears that Microsoft's getting ready to launch Zune for mobile phones around the same time.
According to AdWeek, Microsoft is currently staging a run-off between three advertising agencies--its longstanding advertising partner, McCann Erickson, Crispin Porter + Bogusky (which is overseeing the Windows brand campaign that's making lots of news), and JWT (which recently took over Microsoft's People Ready campaign)--for a product referred to as "Pink."
The article says only that Pink is a mobile service. But according to ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley and other sources, Pink is a code name for the Zune software and services running on mobile phones.
Microsoft is due to pick an agency for the campaign by the end of May, which could mean we'll start seeing ads for Zune on mobile phones by the middle of the summer.
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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. 
Microsoft has a product of zero interest to anybody who's likely to buy it ( http://www.podcastingnews.com/2009/04/10/zero-interest-in-zune-sony-media-players-among-teens/ ) and they're going to bang their heads against a wall again. (Actually its less than zero as teens I know at school are throwing them away for anything else.)
Hey, MIcrosoft owns the office. That should be enough for them. They're a known monopolist and, as the recent "Day Of The Dead Zune" made very clear, they make very shoddy products.
I don't see them building up trust in any other domain.
They should have spun the Zune off into a separate division capable of making it on its own.
As it is, they're running into resistance from the fact that they're Microsoft.
The same for Word and Excel and Windows Server when they were first released.
Take a good look at what happens when MS stays in the game. Will fools like you ever learn?
Yep. Alot of people have a prejudice against the company.
Of course, MS was first to introduce WiFi to an mp3 player but it was almost useless. Apple introduces WiFi with the iPod touch and you have a full blown internet PDA with Mail, Safari, texting, music, movie, and app downloads, etc.
And BTW, X-Box has been a huge cash drain on MS so far. Marketshare yes, profits, no.
People don't have a prejudice against MS, they simply don't care and they don't have an IT department forcing MS down their throats like they did back in the 80s and 90s with PCs and Office.
The PC wars were decided by IT departments. The mobile phone OS wars will be decided by Joe-Average-Consumer.
Yep go ahead and blame those poor overworked, underpaid IT grunts for Microsoft's success. I'm sure they had everything to do with ramming Microsoft products down the throats of their fellow workers.
And Apple never copied anything from the folks who made hard drive based and flash drive based mp3 players before them (i.e. Creative)? How about the mouse and the GUI? I suppose Apple didn't embrace and extend what the Xerox Parc folks invented?
Ah, yes another Apple appologist... Oh wait...
So did you have fun at the Tea Party? Buy your guns yet? Hate will get you everywhere!
Problem is, this economy cannot give Microsoft the play money needed to force a longevity play, like it did with XBox.
@catch23: Word and Excel were first released for the Apple, and had little competition in a rapidly growing market. The XBox was alble to slip in during a tumultuous period in the gaming console wars, and during a time of massive growth for that industry.
Things are far different today. While the mobile market is indeed growing rapidly, the iPhone and Blackberry have already proven themselves as winners, and have rebuffed every attempt by Microsoft to get its foot in the door - in spite of Windows Mobile/CE being around for nearly a decade now. Even HTC, Windows Mobile's biggest champion, is moving towards Android.
Bill Gates has enough cash just in his own bank account to buy out Apple.
@monkeyfun14: Maybe Bill Gates likes a little competition.
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Please tell me you're an Apple person, as this would just be too rich...
That company has a great history of branding and getting people to talk about a product. I mean, look what they did with your "I'm a PC" ads. Heck, look at what they did with Burger King!
Why brand an offering in a market with the boat anchor name that is Zune?
I own a Zune 1st gen, 2 ipods and a Sansa. They all work fine but each has it's weirdness. I like the Sansa best, the ipods come in 2nd. But I use them all and they work. I have yet to meet another person in the physical world where I live with a Zune FWIW. I have met lots with ipods and Sansas,
Time will tell if the MS phone is a good one, don't kill it before it is birthed by calling it a Zune.
90% of the trolls run Mac interesting isn't it.
MS has not done that well in the phone or mp3 market, they would need to do something very special to get the No1 spot in either.
But first I'll need the Apple fanboys to pull their heads out so they can see the proof...
Chances of them duplicating that success again with the ZUNE or any other consumer product is unlikely given the fact that they are two totally different markets. They don't sell an OS to media player vendors. They're basically following the same game plan as a Apple - the current market leader by creating the hardware in the software. If for some reason Apple disappeared from the face of the planet then yes, maybe the ZUNE might have a chance but of course the next to zero.
Whats likely to happen though is Microsoft will eventually concede because already they're throwing a ton of cash in the development of the ZUNE showing little results. They've even lost money on the XBOX as well. So basically none of their consumer products have been doing well.
"Fanboys" seems to be the most popular insult.
Sad...
shame on you ! Does the MS brainwashing go that deep !
saying MS should stay out of the mp3 machine market is like saying hyundai should just go off in a corner and die because toyota is now the number one auto maker in the world. it makes no sense. if sansa and memorex and archos and creative can make mp3 players, why shouldn't microsoft? not everyone has to own the same thing you do, there is such a thing as choice.
the fact is zunes sell. they don't have to be number one. whether they are profitable or not is a different question -and you better believe the profitability factor is considered inside the hallowed halls of M$.
but to be such haters without knowing the profitability figures and being directly involved in the outcome? what a load of fanbois. or are you all MS Entertainment and Devices Division stock holders privy to the profitability calculations?
the latest zune actually works fine as an mp3 player -it has the same major issue as the ipod, in terms of being a closed system, but if you just have music and want to load it on to a portable hard drive to listen to it, it works just great, plus it has an FM radio for when you want to hear the latest news. so what's the problem? I can get and ipod and load music to it and carry it around and listen to mp3s but not the radio. beyond this, there's not much difference unless you are and online shopper, which, if you are, you should know about the concept of choice -you can purchase mp3s from any store, put them on your hard drive and, if they are DRM-free, load them to any mp3 player you have. no need to badmouth the zune just because you like apple. jeez.
I'm not a hater and I do know the profitability of MS consumer divisions. Just look at their quarterly filings. MS makes relatively little money off anything but their OS and Office suite. Pretty much everything else has been a disaster or barely breaking even. For instance their mobile division sold 18 million licenses last year, more than the iPhone, but that only nets them around $250 million at $8 to $15 per license. But that's chicken feed compared to Apple already generating $1 billion in revenue from it's iPhone division. The app store alone is set to reach $1 billion in revenue by next year. MS can only fantasize about that kind of revenue from its consumer divisions.
Just about everyone on this thread is fanboy of one side or another - but it's people like you who cause some of these people to become MS fanboys and buy anything But apple products. People are embarrased to be associated by the likes of you.
Firstly, why do you scoff at a feature people actually use? I don't understand why people think excluding technologies that will one day be void is innovative. Apple fanboys always go on about how their beloved Macs were the first computers to go without a floppy disk drive - as if no one else knew that Eventually we wouldn't need a floppy disk drive. I can guarantee now that VGA ports will one day be obselete - that doesn't mean that companies can just chuck them to be forward thinking.
Then you go on to do what writhes me the most. You talk about profits. For one you somehow think this is relevant when discussing PRODUCTS and their FEATURES not how big the company is - but to make it worse you don't have a clue about the companies profit margins. Office and OS the only bread winners? Does SQL server ring a bell (cause it rings a billion MS bells)? And what about VS and .NET? Xbox, hmm? The fact is that nearly all Microsoft divisions are profitable.
As for your app store nonesense, your profit margin is fiction and Apple only gain a minor fraction of the real revenue - in other words Apple can only dream about that kind of revenue.
I'd love now to compare Microsoft's net profits and Apples but then i'd just be even worse than you.
And you could have said the same thing about Nintendo about 6 years ago and look where they are now. If you're so big on people quitting because they suck then why don't you?
One good thing about owning a Zune: when you see someone else in the wild with one it illicits a supreme sense of....oh wow, someone else actually has a Zune besides me?
(My sister's both got ipod touches as gifts and me the Zune. See? No fanboy wars necessary. Everyone just gets what they want or need. In the end, that's all that matters.)
There is still hope of relevance in the mp3/video player market for the Zune.
Kudos to "Megustansalchichas" *nice user name BTW...if it plays music, vids, and/or pics good enough for me
- by darthbobb July 9, 2009 10:17 PM PDT
- I don't know what "ServedUp" was talking about when he said "Are you referring to the monopoly they have in the OS market after they copied the Mac?" but i do know that back in the 80's when bill gates and his friend (can't remember his name) invented "basic", some hippies in CA (Apple) heard about it and decided to "share" it.
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(33 Comments)the way i see it, all people are very opinionated about everything.
i've never had an apple anything, i never want an apple anything, i really don't like apple and i don't know why.
I've had a pc for 15 years now and i love microsoft.
i also have had every nintendo system (excluding the vertua boy) and am a big fan of them all.
i wouldn't buy a sony until a couple of years ago cause i thought they looked stupid (i love playstations now)
i wouldn't buy an xbox until a couple of days ago because i thought microsoft had no business making a videogame system (i also love xbox now) i've got a zune and a think they're great.
ipods are probably great too but i don't know cause i've never had one and i never will cause i dont like apple for no good reason and i'm not afraid to admit it.
so everyone can go on and on about whats better for every and nobodies gonna change anyone's minds.
if you've owned both and tried both and you like one better then thats fine but it's still just your opinion.
one man's trash is another man's treasure.
apple is my trash but it must be someone's treasure cause they're still around.