The idea for this post was a screed against Microsoft trying to be cool with Zune, its new ipod-whatever service/thing. So let me just get that part out of the way real quick. Take a look at this:
That is what you see after a really cool flash animation plays while you listen to some really cool music. They almost had me… until the “we’re all friends here†bit. Um, no. We’re not. You’re not my friend. You are a mega-corporation trying to sell me something. Not. My. Friend. Ever.
You can see it for yourself here. Now check out the Zune Insider blog, by Cesar Menendez on the Zune team. Look at that earnest face! Look at how it’s Typepad and not MSN spaces or some other Microsoft-y looking thing. There are YouTube videos in it—also not from Microsoft. Maybe I’m just judging them by a double standard: if all their stuff was all corporate-looking and looked another flavor of a SharePoint 2007 blog, they would get eaten alive for that. But everything they’re doing with this looks to me like it’s all carefully calculated to portray something very un-Microsoft in order to engender a (false) authenticity. Like something out of a William Gibson novel. So they lose, either way, and that’s not entirely fair of me, is it? (Anyone from Zune is welcome to leave a comment… I’d love to hear from you!) Maybe they learned something from Scoble, after all.
It could also be that Cesar simply made his own choice with his blogging platform and that the real sign to be interpreted out of all this is that Microsoft is doing things right. That is to say: they are giving the Zune folks the autonomy and the resources to do this thing almost as if they were totally on their own. An independant business unit.
I don’t know if they are or not, but this, along with the dizzying array of new stuff—different stuff—coming out of Redmond these days and in the months to come is all quite unprecedented. They’ve got Google breathing down their necks on one side and Apple on the other, with open source creeping in like a silent mist. They’re competing with everybody! I think Office 2K7 is totally going to be a big hit, but I don’t like Microsoft’s attempt to cram SharePoint down everyone’s throats. It forces all the IT eggs to go into one basket. We really are on the brink of not needing Microsoft, anymore. And they know it. Really, I would love to not need them, but my job needs them: everything I teach is Microsoft or doesn’t run on Linux (like Adobe software). I like OpenOffice, but it just doesn’t hold up against Office 2K3 and it doesn’t even compare to 2K7, which I’ve been using in beta for a while, now.
However, when I saw all the different-but-similar-sounding licenses for Office 2K7, I just laughed sadly and shook my head. They haven’t learned all their lessons, yet! The people at Microsoft who put together the “if Microsoft had designed the iPod packaging†video must have had the Office packaging team on their minds. And what ever possessed them to believe that you should never, ever show the software at work in an advertisement? Everybody uses Office—it’s not like we wouldn’t recognize stuff when we we see it! All they had to do to sell tons more 2K3 was show the Paste Options smart tag in action.
Whatever, they’re just plugging holes punched in by Google. Google is up to some scary game-changing stuff and Microsoft just isn’t. Yet. I give them points for trying to turn such a big ship around.
Technorati Tags: microsoft, zune, marketing, packaging, ms office, office 2007, google, open source, ipod
i think it odd as well how Microsoft can allow this insider to link to the content that he does from the front page of his site. look at some of those sites and there are some serious trademark issues there.
If you’re talking about Cesar, well, he’s on the Microsoft Zune team, isn’t he? I don’t see that’s odd at all. Zunemax.com, eh? Aren’t we just all over this next opportunity!
Good luck with it.
Like flies on turd baby
Yes, I am all over the Zune. Regardless of what many think I see the Zune as becoming huge. The idea of user generated content sales is awesome. The ability for an artist to create, produce and market their own media through the Zune service is going to become one of it’s greatest strengths and in the end the iPod will become runner up in the music business unless they come back VERY strong next year with some serious innovations.
I think Apple took its position as king of the hill for granted and now they will have to scramble to stay ahead. MS has done a lot of dumb things in the ast but the Zune is not one of them.
The ability for an artist to create, produce and market their own media through the Zune service is going to become one of it’s greatest strengths…
I think you’re right about that. It’s a fantastic idea and I hope to see it take root.