Idolator

Bill Gates is the devil...remember that

Maura, you hooker, nice to launch and not tell me. And now I will torment you with comments and make you guess who this is under my anonymous gawker comment handle. muuuuuuuuuwwwwwwwahahahaha.

I'm pretty sure that Gates is throwing down the ole 4-Dog gang sign.

So, is Gates a Crip or a Blood?

Can't I be a sleepy troll WITH an iPod?

MS could really do a great Apple parody ad campaign for Zune. I envision something similar to the ones Apple is running now that bashes PCs... except the two dudes (ipod and zune) are dancing around and the ipod guy suddenly freezes or he collapses (his battery runs out). Madison Avenue... I'm available.

So they wanted to challenge the sexy, sophisticated iPod, and they produced that heinous looking thing? This is a boondoggle of TurboGrafix 16 proportions.

Actually Streakin, that's not going to work...

The iPod's battery life now is 24 hours and the Zune uses Wifi which will devour it's battery (why do you think that they haven't announced it's battery life yet). Also, whoever thought of releasing a brown Zune is probably being fired rigt now.

heinous looking thing that has a huge screen, wifi connectivity, a built in fm tuner, usable picture viewer, and actual battery life. yeah, heinous.

wohho... You forgot to put "and is three inches thick" in your list.

this is so sad for so many reasons.
to quote an indy band who is bundled with zune
"its nothing now" (everything all the time)

I'm down for the Zune action too. I already have an iPod but would totally jump ship for a bigger screen, WiFi, FM radio, portrait and landscape viewing, more listening time, and a music store that offers a subscription service instead of just pay per track. It's like satellite radio that you program yourself.

icky.

Here's the size differences: Dimensions: 4.4h x 2.4w x .58d inches (Compare to iPod 30GB: 4.1h x 2.4w x .43d inches) Weight: 5.6 ounces (Compare to iPod 30GB: 4.8 ounces) So we're looking at something approximately 1/16 of an inch deeper and .8 oz heavier.

You either "get" subscription, to-go music, or you don't. I've learned not to waste my breath on folks tethered to the old-skool paradigm- they just can't see the value of having access and the ability to transport all that music into every listening situation. They're like the folks who couldn't understand video rentals.

Of course, they also can't grasp the fact that every subscription/to-go music provider also provides for actual track sales- anywhere from .79 to .99 per track.

It's not about just subscribing OR buying. It's about choice.

I think Microsoft is assuming a lot on the user's end with the WiFi features. I was initially jealous of this feature (as I have no intentions of switching), but the more I think about it, the less useful this sounds. Unless of course the world unanymously switches to Zune, which it won't.

Wow! This is an exciting device! It looks like they really got it right. And ya know what? That's exactly the same thing I said before I bought my i600 Smartphone. And that piece of shit - despite being specifically built for MS SmartPhone OS to act as a media player, share files with Windows /WMP, etc - was miserable at syncing music, creating playlists, and doing even marginally rudimentary multimedia tasks. And it would hang/crash several times a day. I found that other multifunction phone and PDA devices from mfgrs such as Motorola actually shared and managed media with Windows better than MS' own system did.
I'm not normally an MS hater - I think WinXP, Server2003, and XB-360 are all fine systems, but my experience gives me very little confidence in MS' ability to deliver reiliability, functionality, and usability in the handheld world.
So, given that SmartPhone was years in the making and Zune was essentially rushed to market, I predict that Zune makes iPod's battery and reliability issues pale in comparison.

Oooo . . . an FM transmitter! Because we've been gagging for that! I can't count the times I've been listening to shuffle and suddenly thought, "gee, I would sure like to listen to some butt rockright now. Or maybe that witty jock commentator instead of my BBC podcasts." And, I'm sorry, but the different layout option is just something else for MS to screw up and force the user to install multiple patches and fixes.

This is not a device to combat the iPod; Microsoft ain't that confident (and dumb). This is a product to appease the investment community that MSFT is looking forward, and diversifying from its OS past. Speaking of, what wrong with diverting consumer attention from the lateness of Vista? P.S. The turd color is that middle ground between Apple's blackness and whiteness; see, refined marketing strategy!