Comments on: Zune Beats iPod: How Apple Can Learn from Microsoft’s Success

By: Angie

Angie — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 18:39:46 +0000

You people crack me up. Apple's big problem has always been that they won't realease something until it's perfection. Prototype, prototype, prototype, so then other people keep beating them to the punch. MS's big problem has always been they rush production just to get something into our hands whether it works or not. The iPod is an example of how Apple used MS methods to create a success. Why does everyone hate MS? They have the best software, always have (I can hear the groans), whether you like their methods or not, most of you are using them The early iPods were junk, everyone knows it. Most of them were literally thrown in the trash, because they were also unfixable. But the later iPods are awesome. So they rushed the product to market (like MS), but they kept at it until they achieved perfection, and now the iPod is an icon for this generation of music lovers. From a marketing standpoint, they are cool, so the kids buy them. Come on, hasn't everyone seen the Target commercials with the iPods hanging on the etheric outlines of all the beautiful people's necks, it's BONO for God's sake, who could resist? Free enterprise is a beautiful thing.

By: Ian Bell

Ian Bell — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 10:22:22 +0000

I want to point out that the last 4 posts are from the same person using different names. Clearly he has not read the article otherwise he would have caught the tongue-in-cheek tone to it. Clearly Rob is saying that the Zune failed big time here…

By: guantar

guantar — Mon, 01 Jan 2007 20:21:32 +0000

Zune is a failure. It is crap and everyone smells it. In the last year it was out it didn't even sell half a mill, while apple sold 39 million ipods in the the last year.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/busines...

There are plenty of zunes sitting on shelves, especially the brown ones and no one wants them. This discussion is over except for microsoft fanboys with secret buyers remorse.

By: davey

davey — Mon, 01 Jan 2007 20:03:38 +0000

video on a zune looks much worse than on an ipod. The screens an both are the same resolution but the larger Zune screen makes the video blocky. The slightly smaller and way brighter ipod screen has a crispness that the zune cant match. Also for video the ipod (80GB) holds 2 and a half times as much as a soon for $80 more (street).
Zune sucks, it is a dismal failure and the only people hyping it up on boards are paid by microsloth. Beware.

By: Laughing at "Laughing at morons"

Laughing at "Laughing at morons" — Mon, 01 Jan 2007 11:56:00 +0000

Why would anyone compare the Zune with the first gen ipod? It is 2007 :) MS had nothing to do for 5 years but watch and learn as Apple created and developed a truly innovative product into a cultural icon. And M$ didn't learn a thing. It still rushes second rate, over priced, dated garbage to market before it is in working order.

on a side note: I was in Target the other day and 2 kids where playing with a brown zune and they kept calling it the "****box 360", it was funny as hell but I think it tells you a lot about how young people are embracing this abomination.

And Apples will ship with bootcamp so creative people can keep their macs at work and still get on with you corporate weasels.

By: Laughing at morons

Laughing at morons — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 23:37:18 +0000

You mac weenies are a riot. With all of you out in force raving about how bad the Zune is, even though it's obvious you've never even been in the same room with one, it just confirms that you are scared to death the only halfway decent thing apple has ever made will also go the way of the mac (obsolete junk).

If you compare the Zune to the first ipod, Microsoft has done a stellar job (as in it actually works as edvertised).

While I would agree that the Zune market place is lame, the itunes marketplace is just as lame. DRM is Lame and if you buy DRM music YOU are also lame. There are (legal) DRM free services where you could buy music and if you don't want to do that you could always buy a CD and rip that.

As for the Zune. It's great. The video looks awesome, the music plays as expected (great)and the headphones are not that bad. In fact, I picked up a set of sony headphones and went back to the zune ones, because they sounded better and were more comfortable. Now that there is a hack to allow you to use the Zune as a harddrive, there is nothing left for me to complain about.

What's really going to be funny is when apple starts to ship their macs with Windows installed. Why else would they spend so much time on bootcamp.

By: Me

Me — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 23:22:00 +0000

Yep, this thing is so bad that I bought one, then bought a bunch of accesories for it. Now I recommending that all my friends buy one over an ipod. I mean, really, this is obviously a heap. It looks good, it does everything it says it would, it's near impossible to scratch. and it doesn't require iTunes. Yep, what a heap.

By: Paul Greatbatch

Paul Greatbatch — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 21:26:20 +0000

So much money, so little creativity.

Why did they feel the need to even get into this business? What Gatesian or Ballmerian ego pushed this? And why would they think that people were going to line up for the 'social' in the same way they would a PS3?

The only way they have succeeded in the Windows and Office arenas is to maintain an illegal monopoly and count on the global apathy of corporate IT managers to change for the better.

By: Daniel Miller

Daniel Miller — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 13:59:21 +0000

I agree with dw, that microsoft will be back. I don't think the original Xbox was that big of a hit, especially in Japan, but MS stuck with it and I think it paid off in the end.

The Zune is such a HUGE failure though, I really hope some people are fired over there because of it. They can't take advantage of consumers like that, we are just not that stupid!

By: dw

dw — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 07:21:14 +0000

You forgot:

Apple's Cube and Newton giving MS a run for their money.

anyhoo, MS will be back. I'll never buy MS products simply because of their iconic stature for corporate corruption, greed and bureaucratic bungling of products.

If I didn't have the choice of Apple I'd probably look to Sandisk or creative for a player.
MS will redesign this thing and it will be improved. Don't think it will out sell sandisk, they are suprisingly doing well with over 10% market share.