Is this really a surprise to anyone?

Does anyone have any figures on actual number of Zunes sold? I remember it being said that the Zune would be such a flop that it wouldn't sell more than 50,000 units or so. Seems like that might end up being the case if its at #18 during its debut.

Not even a dent in the PMP market!

I'm simply asking because I don't know: How long did it take the iPod's numbers to soar? It has only been two weeks and the market is already saturated. I think MS is going to need to be in this for the long haul.

5-year plan, guys, c'mon! Do you really think MS is short-sighted enough to think they could contend with Apple after only 2 weeks?!

But here's where being Microsoft helps you. If you're really determined to crack this market, this was IE2; a decent first step to get into the market. Now you can afford to bleed money for a couple of years refining the concept, and you can strongarm retailers into continuing to give you endcaps and shelf space. Junyo brand players don't sell well, I burn through my VC funding in 18 months then go back to work for my uncle. MS can sell units as a hobby pretty much indefinitely, until they get it right or get tired of the business.

5-year plan, guys, c'mon! Did you really think that MS was short-sighted enough to think they could contend with Apple after only 2 weeks?!

Where MS really has the advantage is their ability to lose a little cash on the project in the beginning. They can throw millions (billions?) at this and still be well off.

I am a happy owner of a brown Zune and I am getting really tired of everyone trashing a product that is 1st Gen, 2 weeks out, and a first attempt by a company.

Cut 'em some slack.

Size is a deal breaker with the Zune.

"MS can sell units as a hobby pretty much indefinitely, until they get it right or get tired of the business."

All well and good, but why should anyone buy a Zune NOW? Let's wait until they're selling the things for $99 and/or it's ahead of the rest. For now, don't touch it.

Size is only a deal breaker if you are comparing it to flash based PMP's. That's apples and oranges.

I'm really disappointed in the price of the Zune. I was expecting MS to be undercutting the competition in price as a way to force their way into the market.

I'm not willing to drop $250 on an unproven competitor. Heck, I'm not even willing to drop $250 on a proven winner.

For what ever reason, $150 is about the max I'm willing to drop on an MP3 player. Unless MS starts selling these at a loss, I'll be Zuneless for the forseable future.

Needs to be thinner and needs WIFI to be cracked, any word on non DRM mp3's? can they be sent via its wifi to another zune?

I'm not really sure why I want one of these, but I do. My dad was a big betamax guy so maybe that explains it.

I think nobody knows what Zune is anyways; I am surprised MS didn't throw enough marketing bucks on the device, get some decent primetime airtime yet.

I played around with it at BestBuy today, it was more impressive than I imagined, but still underwhelming and not compelling enough for me to leave my iPod. For that thickness, it needs a bigger harddrive than my currently maxed out 30GB ipod's, and I wish it could be used as an external harddrive for that matter, without a hack.

I guess I'll see where the zune goes with future firmware updates and generations.

I saw 'Borat' on Sat night (yeah, I'm late) - and they played a Zune commercial before the movie started (the one with The 88 song) and I heard the woman behind me say to her companion, "what's the social? what is that thing." To which he said, "I'm not sure."

Well played, Microsoft. Well played.

Another bit of useless information... thnx gizmodo!

I've read a lot of variations on "Yeah but how long did it take the iPod's numbers to soar?" and there really is no comparison. The iPod came out during a time when no one had an mp3 player, and no one knew they wanted one. There was no market for mp3 players. Now the market for mp3 players is fully saturated. If the Zune couldn't take off right away, it's never going to take off. It's a product that no one was asking for, introduced by a company that just wanted to sell an mp3 player to compete. Also, if no one is buying them, the only compelling feature (song sharing) is null and void.

Looks like the Zune is winning the Race to the Bottom! But give it time, they will amke it there!

3G iPod and 1G Nano Owner. Mac fans unite!

Ditto to S5 I was about to make the same comment, these comments about how the technology market was FIVE years ago? give me a break, if the core duo wasn't successful on launch and we went ahead and started to comment about the pIII 1.3ghz would that really be a capable comparison? Nop. Well said s5, living in the present does provide a bit more insight vs living in the past when those top 12 players didn't control 80% of the market.

I had a discussion with a customer today who was a little dismayed to learn the 'wifi' advertised doesn't allow the mp3 to sync via wifi. he then backtracked "well i can just use it as a hard drive out of the box right?". Nope, you could do a third party walk around. "So what you're telling me is that it doesn't do everything the ipod already does and doesn't really live up to what it advertises?" (amazingly most people in middle america aren't the hobbyies enthusiast crowd and don't really feel like manually editing dll's to install, etc, shocking but true). I explain how the wifi and sharing of songs works, he walks away with a Ipod Video... and that's the crucial problem people like s5 and I are realizing right off, if you can't come to the market with the features everyone is used to, and provide an even better set, then you're going to have a hell of a time making a dent (especially combined with a shit rollout-advertising campaign).

cheers s5.

SIZE is the dealbreaker? Are you serious? Have you held or played with one? It feels pretty good in my hands. Sure, it's not iPod mini / nano, but its not bad. I really like the feel of the thing.

That being said, the DRM, the fact that you can't use it as an external storage device, the money that Univeral (?) gets with each sale and broken installer makes this a real loser.

It is too early to tell if this product to sell, for a couple of reasons.

One, Christmas is coming around the corner and people maybe waiting for it to come closer due to finical situations.
Two, I haven't seen a whole lot of ads for this product on air.
Three, some of the ads are unclear to what they are selling, although apple kind of does the same thing hehe.

So if it doesn't sell after Jan 07 (Let people get Christmas money too, which Christmas needs to pass first) then it may not be a good selling product. But give Microsoft a break all their products have been... ok. It was their first shot and we know ms sucks at first shots i could name a bunch but then again apple did forget right click, oops another shot at apple I'm a bad boy.

Hey, at least I will be able to buy a $5 30 GB mp3 player next year on eBay. It will go great with my Pioneer Laserdisc and Sega Normad. Well at least this can show money can't buy cool or desirable or even apart of common knowledge.

Size is not a deal breaker? If you're fine holding out a brick in your hand or pocket, more power to you. Showed it to my girlfriend (at Bestbuy)over the weekend and she said "Ewww. What is that thing?" I told her it had WiFi to which she responded "Why would I use WiFi if it looks so ugly, big, and heavy?"

MS needs to come out with a product that stands out positively. Not something that looks like a boxy turd. Glad that she didnt like it anyways. The less MS interferes with my life, the better.

Hey Zune,

Welcome to the social. Here's your fruit punch.

"Needs to be thinner and needs WIFI to be cracked, any word on non DRM mp3's? can they be sent via its wifi to another zune?"

well there is a workaround. it's all over websites today (maybe even this one - i forget where i saw it). it's not that great though. copying your music to a thumb drive and taking it to your friend's house is still easier.

this all assumes you have a friend of course. or a friend with a zune.

Microsoft had a real opportunity to smash ipod but missed the boat completely. Why do they not play all divx files? And why can't you just drop folders of music straight on? (I hate having to tag my music on my Ipod).

I would love someone to tell me I am wrong so I can go buy one.

Oops, the rating's already dropped. Zune's position is now 21, with 14 models of iPod ahead. Maybe all the fanbois already got theirs and it's all downhill from this point...

See, the reason I like my iPod is that I don't WANT to listen to other people's music. And if you come to my house and bring your own music for me to listen to, you're getting a beating.

Is that what the Zune is? That one guy, the one who always wants to play songs for you, and gets hurt and defensive when you don't love them like a lost brother? The one who's always holding out his disgusting earphones and saying "Dude, you have GOT to here this. It's a brain-damaged 14-year-old from Kokomo who jumps on his guitar and yowls. I think he's signed with Matador." Because I have to admit, I don't like that guy much.

I knew I didn't want one, but now I'm afraid I couldn't be friends with anyone who does.

EBW: that's the greatest comment I've read in years.

Whats worse.. is that 80 percent of the zunes bought at costco are being returned because of shorter then expected batery life. Every time i get called to member returns i have to listen to the same story. "This ipod only last 4 hours". Ma'am its not an ipod.

But here's where being Microsoft helps you. If you're really determined to crack this market, this was IE2; a decent first step to get into the market.

So if the Zune is adhering to the IE model, we can expect a couple of minor updates to be followed by seven years of stagnation?

It's a product that no one was asking for, introduced by a company that just wanted to sell an mp3 player to compete.

I think you're dead wrong there. There are plenty of mp3 players out there, but the iPod is the only one with a strong piece of software attached to it. Microsoft is trying to make an mp3 player with specific software to match it. Thats is severely LACKING in the market right now.

Microsoft's answer isn't all that strong, but as said above, they have the capital to take their time on this and get it right. I think it's pretty stupid to write this thing off right away. It's been two weeks.

Is this really a BIG surprise to people?

I feel the Zune is just entering in this race way too late to have a huge impact.

I'm getting sick and tired of hearng about how the illustrious (see: terrible) Ipod software is *any* kind of selling point for an ipod.

Customer: Hey, cool an ipod
employee: Yeah, it's an ipod. Holds twenty bajilion songs.
Customer: OH sick, does it come in black?
employee: i believe it does.
customer: Nyeh I'll stick with white.

Fictitious part of conversation

Customer: How's the bundled software with that bad boy? Will it provide me w/seamless vertical integration, or...?

Yeah you get the point.

I feel the Zune is just entering in this race way too late to have a huge impact.

tell it to the xbox. :P

the store is a selling point as opposed to the actual software.

tell it to the xbox. :P

What? Zune's gonna lose 4 billion dollars too?

Actually, the iPod offered two distinct advantages over its competitors.

First, while it wasn't the first hard-drive based MP3 player out there (the Creative Nomad was), it was the first to come in such a small formfactor. The Nomad Jukebox was a huge CD player (weighed way more, at that) - there were CD players that were smaller than the thing. Battery life was atrocious as well, which didn't help matters. At least Creative gave you replacable recharables - you needed 'em! Now, the iPod suddenly comes out and gives better battery life, and in a formfactor that's a bit more pocketable. It was smaller in disk space (5GB vs. 6GB), but size does matter - especially when you're 1/3rd the size of the competition or less.

Secondly, you could add your music to it in a reasonable amount of time. The Nomad Jukebox only had USB 1.1 (USB2.0 wasn't popular (or even around?) yet). So it literally took overnight to add gigs of music to it. Whereas the iPod took minutes in comparison.

The iPod took off, despite its stratospheric pricetag (nearly $500, IIRC) because it was the right product at the right time. People were getting into MP3s thanks to the Napster controversy. Flash players were crap - they could barely hold one album. Hard drive players were huge and bulky. Now comes along a device that is slightly bigger than a flash player, yet holds lots of music. (As a side benefit, they could serve as hard drives too to boot computers or store regular data without drivers).

I think that one key element of all this is how people who own windows at the moment will view the Zune. I run windows, and I previously owned an iPod before it got lost/stolen. I for one would be cautious to by the Zune, based on Microsoft's inherent ability to make updates and improvements far and few between. This whole 5 year plan is very familiar sounding.
Also, I think one of the reasons that the zune is at the number 2 spot is that the portable mp3 player market is already established as a fixture in today's society. when the iPod came about, mp3 players existed, but were uncommon and unnoticed by everyone. I have seen many things that compare the rise of the iPod to the rise of the zune, stating that the zune has jumped onto the market, while the iPod has exponentially climbed from very low numbers. The reason that the zune is selling is because of the iPod. if the iPod was not there, was not so dominant, we would not care at all about the zune. While competition is good, and I would like to see a cheaper 30GB mp3 player, I have a hard time believing that the zune will get the customer base that will ensure popularity of it's wireless capacity. There are other devices that offer connectivity (handheld gaming systems), and the people who play with others wirelessly would comprise the majority of people who would use this feature beyond the first few weeks.
To take advantage of it's features, the zune needs a dominant or at the very least equivalent market share to the iPod. The chances of this happening are slim, because of all of the things that the iPod has going for it. the iPod makes a better looking gift, it is more aesthetically pleasing, and while you do need to put it in a case, no other mp3 player on the market has the same impact that the iPod affords users.

Oh, PLEASE. They don't know a single thing about DAP/PMPs! What's a player without podcasting? And who was in charge of Marketing and Sales? "Welcome to the new Social?" For a bunch of nerds, it's so freakin' hard to believe that they are using Engrish! And why the hell would music from playsforsure online stores be untransferable? Isn't that just crap? M$ created that DRM from all the RIAA pressure, and then they create their own special Zune DRM and Zune Marketplace for their Zune player! I think M$ copies Apple exactly, but not precisely.

Ok Ok come on... I know the zune isn't the hottest thing on the market, but it's been like a few months, ipod has gained its popularity over years and years! But if Microsoft launches something big on there software like video and podcasts features along with new models of zunes and uh... um... well zune I think can make it..