“Coming from a base of zero against a 80% market share holder such as iPod was always going to be a monumental task. Microsoft’s strategy of pitting like against like will make it an impossible one,” Stan Beer writes for iTWire.
“The so-called iPod killer, code-named Zune, looks to be simply a me too effort from an IT company that is flailing in all directions trying to find ways to spend its huge pile of excess cash to buy itself into new markets,” Beer writes.
“Noting that Apple’s formula for success appears to be working very well these days, Microsoft is spending resources on developing its own hardware division. Instead of just mouses and keyboards, Microsoft now produces games consoles, web cams and soon Wi-Fi music players,” Beer writes.
Beer writes, “As far as the music players are concerned, Microsoft will probably succeed in gaining a few points of market share. Maybe even a double digit share. However, it is more likely to grab that share off the non-iPod users than Apple.”
Beer writes, “iPod has a dominant market share and the only thing that can break that is a technology that introduces a paradigm shift. Unless there’s something very special that Microsoft has up its sleeve, Zune does not appear to be that paradigm shift.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Peter” for the heads up.]
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M$ – probably on its way to making it’s own PCs, and they will likely make bigger leaps, like abandoning DOS.
Of course, all that takes time in a company like M$.
Apple showed them the way to go (again)
Yea john has it right.
iPods are huge in America but maybe 50% worldwide.
Competition is tough in this market. Asian markets like the cheap
What Microsoft will do in undercut everyone else.
They’ll be happy to lose money the first 3-5 years
like with xBox, it costs more to build than wha tthey charge. They have huge amounts of money and can and will play unfair.
We’ll see in they can first get ahead of Sandisc.
Microsoft is doing whatever it takes to keep consumers from becoming loyal to Apple b/c they know once that happens, the shift from Windows to OS X & Macs will begin. If the migration is large enough, then there is a strong chance that Apple could pick up some serious steam in the corporate IT market.
All I know is that Microsoft is nothing but a big copycat. Nothing ORIGINAL has ever come from that company. Their flagship products were all copycats from others – no need to mention who they copied.
Excuse me, I’m looking for a new bag, and could you make sure it has a holder for my ZUNE?
Yes, I’d like some jeans, preferably with a pocket for my ZUNE.
It almost sounds obscene.
Nice job already, Microtards.
In Spain for example you can only speak to customer support in English!
Why doesn’t Apple go to off-shore phone support in Spain? Like Texas.
Perhaps when they sell half as many iPods in Spain as they do in Texas alone, then Apple might consider actually putting a call support center there….
Ken is correct. Without some kind of base you cannot have a backup of your music in case the Ipod dies or is lost. If microsoft thinks people are just going to sit in coffee shops and download music all day long they are mistaken. Ipod users get most of their songs from their CD collection not the music store. And if users have broadband at home that I am sure they have a computer. Ken’s dock idea is a great one. If it has a digital out on it like the new mini that would be great. Also, wouldn’t be a bad idea to add this functionality into the HiFi boom box.
I can see the sharing of songs (of course not ones bought from the music store) as cool especially for kids as part of the whole social networking phenomenon. Maybe Apple can add this. But, how do the record companies like it knowing their songs from people’s CD collections are being so easily shared? Maybe if you can sample 30 seconds or something but that seems like a lot of work to go through when you can just hand someone the headphones….am I missing something?
Zune, in addition to rhyming with SOON also rhymes with TUNE, so Mr Softness’ music sight will probably be called iZunes.