No. Considering the hype and resources brought to bear by the world's largest tech company, it is, at best, a very mediocre start month for Zune. \
hat's not saying anything.
Unfortunately, seemingly everything that Microsoft does starts with small with a product with a laughably low acceptance rate, and many of them grow to be major market forces that no competitor can afford to ignore.
Unfortunately, seemingly everything that Microsoft does starts with small with a product with a laughably low acceptance rate, and many of them grow to be major market forces that no competitor can afford to ignore.
The problem is, when Microsoft can't leverage Windows or Office to their advantage, they have to compete on a level playing field. And when they have to do that, they don't do nearly as well.
Thus, MS's success in this venture is far from assured. It's more likely that they'll keep throwing money at a 'me too' product that doesn't come anywhere near dominating the market, and loses money for them. Basically the Xbox model, redux. Color me unimpressed. \
Thus, MS's success in this venture is far from assured.
In business, nothing is ever assured. Microsoft has plenty of duds, but the first generation of a product is not an indicator by which to evaluate the future of one of their products. Often they don't hit it big until the third or fourth generation, with or without Windows or Office leverage.
In business, nothing is ever assured. Microsoft has plenty of duds but the first generation of a product is not an indicator for them, often they don't hit it big until the third or fourth generation, with or without Windows or Office leverage.
Let's just say their batting average has been less than great without Windows or Office leverage. And in the consumer electronics space, they're at a disadvantage, since they do not place top priority on design or ease-of-use... Apple's strengths, and core reasons why the iPod has been a break-out success.
MS is playing catch-up, plain and simple, and in a space where they have no long-term aces-in-the-hole, other than being able to lose a whole lot of money. That buys them a big marketing budget and the ability to price at a loss, but even with that, 9% of the HD player market and 2% overall is all they get?? Blah.
That's what happens when you're the follower in a market space. MS needs to innovate to have a chance, and its just not in their corporate DNA to do much of that. They're a fast follower, 'me too' company... its what they do.
And it works... when they can leverage Windows or Office.
Let's just say their batting average has been less than great without Windows or Office leverage. And in the consumer electronics space, they're at a disadvantage, since they do not place top priority on design or ease-of-use... Apple's strengths, and core reasons why the iPod has been a break-out success.
I don't think that argument works. MS hasn't necessarily placed top priority on design or ease-of-use on Windows, but Windows is not a market failure.
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MS is playing catch-up, plain and simple, and in a space where they have no long-term aces-in-the-hole, other than being able to lose a whole lot of money. That buys them a big marketing budget and the ability to price at a loss, but even with that, 9% of the HD player market and 2% overall is all they get?? Blah.
That's what happens when you're the follower in a market space. MS needs to innovate to have a chance, and its just not in their corporate DNA to do much of that. They're a fast follower, 'me too' company... its what they do.
And it works... when they can leverage Windows or Office.
MS has almost always been a catch-up company, and I don't remember Microsoft ever innovating, but they are there. I don't understand why you say Zune isn't leveraging Windows. It sounds like some sort of BS phrase. I don't know what product leverages Office.
I don't think that argument works. MS hasn't necessarily placed top priority on design or ease-of-use on Windows, but Windows is not a market failure.
There are a host of historical reasons for that that have no analogue in the current MP3 market. Indeed, if anything Apple is in the position that MS was.
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MS has almost always been a catch-up company, and I don't remember Microsoft ever innovating, but they are there. I don't understand why you say Zune isn't leveraging Windows. It sounds like some sort of BS phrase. I don't know what product leverages Office.
IE was entirely a creature of simply being included as part of Windows. Various levels of enterprise integration leverage the hell out of Office.
The only way MS could do a comparable job of leveraging their OS monopoly in the MP3 player market is to include a Zune in the box with every windows machine sold.
IE was entirely a creature of simply being included as part of Windows. Various levels of enterprise integration leverage the hell out of Office.
The only way MS could do a comparable job of leveraging their OS monopoly in the MP3 player market is to include a Zune in the box with every windows machine sold.
Oh no. You just put the idea into MS' head thus they will integrate the "zune marketplace" as a default song download store and as part of upcoming vista. Then they bundle zune in every vista copy. And just like the pre-installed windows in every new pc, MS will bundle the zune with Dell.
"and the government puts fluoride in our water" ( RvB )
dude are you seriously that much of a conspiracy theorist?
Actually it's a pretty documented fact that Microsoft does things like that - they have hired PR firms to write fake letters to the editor praising MS products.
MS hasn't necessarily placed top priority on design or ease-of-use on Windows, but Windows is not a market failure.
Actually, Windows did put some priority on design and ease-of-use, by imitating the MacOS. One of Bill Gates' most (in)famous quotes was one to his programmers: "That's not what a Mac does. I want Mac on the PC, I want Mac on a PC."
Now, I don't know that they did a particularly great job of imitating the Mac OS, but at least they were copying a well-designed, easy-to-use OS. Windows owes some of its market success to that, plus a variety of other very well-known factors.
Far as the mp3 player space goes, if you honestly think that the iPod's success isn't due in significant part to great design and ease-of-use, you simply haven't been paying attention.
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MS has almost always been a catch-up company, and I don't remember Microsoft ever innovating, but they are there. I don't understand why you say Zune isn't leveraging Windows.
How is the Zune leveraging Windows in any major way? Is a shiny new Zune included with every Windows PC? Does iTunes automatically break due to insidious Windows coding? Or, instead, are Windows users perfectly free to use iPods with their Windows PCs, and do so in very large numbers?(hint: The correct answer is 'Yes'). Given that, are you aware of something that no one else is?
Oh and btw, just got back from my last Xmas shopping stop... a GameStop. They were selling Zunes. Oddly, there seemed to be a mini-mountain of them still there, right by the register too, even though its Xmas Eve. I asked the salesguy what was up after buying my game gift:
Me: Hey, how's the Zune selling for ya?
Him: *laughs* It's not.
Me: Yeah. iPod imitation machine, I guess.
Him: Yep. And people know it. No one seems to want one.
Heh. We got cableTV now so we get all sort of stuff/junk like Tyra Banks Show, and the Christmas-sy episode was a Best Buy thing where she got a few presents and gave the audience all the stuff. The mp3 player was,....... *drum roll*....... a Samsung Yepp, recommended tunes from NapsterToGo. Looks like BestBuy, Samsung and Napster got in on the deal with Tyra and the show's producers, no sign of Apple anywhere. Well, that other 30% to 40% or whatever has got to come from somewhere ...Personally my biased view is I don't like all these other little dogs nipping at Apple's heels. It needs to give them one swift kick. (Not that I condone violence against animals, especially small furry cute ones).
At my local shopping mall, at the major department store (Myer) it seemed to be all about the iPods, and with a few iMacs and laptops around, a nice big Apple logo, I think they cleared a decent high % of iPods and the other mp3 players definitely seemed like they were getting less attention, and of course, Australia is Zune-free at this stage. I think the Shuffles were pretty much sold out at my local mall. Also the Xbox360 was most expensive compared to Wii and PS2 and PSP and NintendoDS, so not sure how well it did.
Mums and dads could not get the kids away from the 20" and 24" iMacs, they had to pretty much keep saying, "OK I'm going now, I'm going now, last time... I'm going now......." to pull the kids away from the iMac and iPhoto and stuff. The 20" and 23" Cinema Displays totally rocked, they are expensive and you can get cheaper/ better spec'ed stuff, but nothing really as sexy as them....
MS is known for selling hardware at a loss because unlike Apple they understand they are a software, not hardware company.
And what you are failing to realize is that there is no software to sell here. iTunes is given away (as is the Zune software), and Apple does not make significant profits on iTMS. No online music store makes significant profits, and the Zune store is not going to be any different. Eventually MSFT has to make money on the devices themselves.
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I'm not sure of too many things they failed at, very few would have predicted the MS would take over Sony and it has, Ps3 will fail and the 360has done very well as an example.
The reason you're not too sure of things they failed at is that you've never heard of them because few people use them (that's why they're failures!). Their list of failures is too long to enumerate and includes the vast majority of the products they ship today. The only true successes they have had have been Windows and Office. Everything else has ranged from a negligible success to unmitigated failure (including the oft-cited XBox - the fact of the matter is that even if 360 outsells PS3, it still is unlikely to ever make enough money to offset the massive losses of the first XBox...and regardless both PS3 and 360 look like they will come in 2nd to the Wii...possibly a distant 2nd).
Don't believe me? Check out MSFT's latest 10-K. Here is all you really need to know:
Total profit in 2006: $16.5 billion
Client Segment Profit (i.e., Windows XP): $10.2 billion
Server and Tools Segment Profit (i.e., Windows Server): $4.3 billion
Information Worker Segment Profit (i.e., Office): $8.3 billion
The fact that those 3 segments already total $6.3 billion of profit MORE than the total profit should be ringing alarm bells - obviously the other segments must be, on net, money losers. And they are. (for those unfamiliar with how businesses run, money losing means NOT SUCCESSFUL)
The other segments - Home & Entertainment, MSN, Business Solutions, and Mobile & Embedded - range from 0 profit (which is actually a loss, after accounting for overhead that is not assigned to any particular division) to $1.3 billion loss (Home & Entertainment). But at least with the XBox/XBox360 you can claim it is early in the second generation and maybe someday will do better. Windows CE/Mobile is on its sixth generation or something like that, MSN (sorry, now "Windows Live") has been around for over a decade...if these things had a good chance of making money, they'd have done it by now.
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People keep bringing up Creative Labs thats not a valid comparision, Creative does not have the pure business power that MS has in the market.
Ah, but even with MSFT's willingness to take a loss on the hardware, the Zune is STILL losing quite badly to the 30 GB Creative Zen Vision (as of this post, Zen is #13 on Amazon's electronics list, Zune is #55). Honestly, if anything the Creative comparison is flattering to Zune...they have a lot of ground to go before they can even catch Creative! Forget about the iPod - the relevant question is whether Zune can beat Creative's marketshare before the end of the decade.
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MS is like Walmart, Homedepot and Lowes they have such a strong hold on the market they can lose money short term on one product and there overall product line picks up the difference while the competition gets killed off.
You seem very confused - it is Apple that has a strong hold on the MP3 player/online music market, not MS. MS has no hold...that is why they are trying desperate Hail Mary passes like throwing Zune out on the market for a loss. The only "competition" they have any hope of killing off is their PlaysForSure "partners" like Creative. That will be a pretty pyrrhic victory...though at the rate they are going it is doubtful that they will even achieve that.
You seem very confused - it is Apple that has a strong hold on the MP3 player/online music market, not MS. MS has no hold...that is why they are trying desperate Hail Mary passes like throwing Zune out on the market for a loss. The only "competition" they have any hope of killing off is their PlaysForSure "partners" like Creative. That will be a pretty pyrrhic victory...though at the rate they are going it is doubtful that they will even achieve that.
And the scary thing is, MS probably makes money selling their software to Creative yet loses money selling it themselves on their own hardware.
Comments
No. Considering the hype and resources brought to bear by the world's largest tech company, it is, at best, a very mediocre start month for Zune.
hat's not saying anything.
Unfortunately, seemingly everything that Microsoft does starts with small with a product with a laughably low acceptance rate, and many of them grow to be major market forces that no competitor can afford to ignore.
hat's not saying anything.
Unfortunately, seemingly everything that Microsoft does starts with small with a product with a laughably low acceptance rate, and many of them grow to be major market forces that no competitor can afford to ignore.
The problem is, when Microsoft can't leverage Windows or Office to their advantage, they have to compete on a level playing field. And when they have to do that, they don't do nearly as well.
Thus, MS's success in this venture is far from assured. It's more likely that they'll keep throwing money at a 'me too' product that doesn't come anywhere near dominating the market, and loses money for them. Basically the Xbox model, redux. Color me unimpressed.
.
Thus, MS's success in this venture is far from assured.
In business, nothing is ever assured. Microsoft has plenty of duds, but the first generation of a product is not an indicator by which to evaluate the future of one of their products. Often they don't hit it big until the third or fourth generation, with or without Windows or Office leverage.
In business, nothing is ever assured. Microsoft has plenty of duds but the first generation of a product is not an indicator for them, often they don't hit it big until the third or fourth generation, with or without Windows or Office leverage.
Let's just say their batting average has been less than great without Windows or Office leverage. And in the consumer electronics space, they're at a disadvantage, since they do not place top priority on design or ease-of-use... Apple's strengths, and core reasons why the iPod has been a break-out success.
MS is playing catch-up, plain and simple, and in a space where they have no long-term aces-in-the-hole, other than being able to lose a whole lot of money. That buys them a big marketing budget and the ability to price at a loss, but even with that, 9% of the HD player market and 2% overall is all they get?? Blah.
That's what happens when you're the follower in a market space. MS needs to innovate to have a chance, and its just not in their corporate DNA to do much of that. They're a fast follower, 'me too' company... its what they do.
And it works... when they can leverage Windows or Office.
.
besides fixing broken MS shit employs me and gives me steady work, no outsourcing threat in that field.
Let's just say their batting average has been less than great without Windows or Office leverage. And in the consumer electronics space, they're at a disadvantage, since they do not place top priority on design or ease-of-use... Apple's strengths, and core reasons why the iPod has been a break-out success.
I don't think that argument works. MS hasn't necessarily placed top priority on design or ease-of-use on Windows, but Windows is not a market failure.
MS is playing catch-up, plain and simple, and in a space where they have no long-term aces-in-the-hole, other than being able to lose a whole lot of money. That buys them a big marketing budget and the ability to price at a loss, but even with that, 9% of the HD player market and 2% overall is all they get?? Blah.
That's what happens when you're the follower in a market space. MS needs to innovate to have a chance, and its just not in their corporate DNA to do much of that. They're a fast follower, 'me too' company... its what they do.
And it works... when they can leverage Windows or Office.
MS has almost always been a catch-up company, and I don't remember Microsoft ever innovating, but they are there. I don't understand why you say Zune isn't leveraging Windows. It sounds like some sort of BS phrase. I don't know what product leverages Office.
I don't think that argument works. MS hasn't necessarily placed top priority on design or ease-of-use on Windows, but Windows is not a market failure.
There are a host of historical reasons for that that have no analogue in the current MP3 market. Indeed, if anything Apple is in the position that MS was.
MS has almost always been a catch-up company, and I don't remember Microsoft ever innovating, but they are there. I don't understand why you say Zune isn't leveraging Windows. It sounds like some sort of BS phrase. I don't know what product leverages Office.
IE was entirely a creature of simply being included as part of Windows. Various levels of enterprise integration leverage the hell out of Office.
The only way MS could do a comparable job of leveraging their OS monopoly in the MP3 player market is to include a Zune in the box with every windows machine sold.
IE was entirely a creature of simply being included as part of Windows. Various levels of enterprise integration leverage the hell out of Office.
The only way MS could do a comparable job of leveraging their OS monopoly in the MP3 player market is to include a Zune in the box with every windows machine sold.
Oh no. You just put the idea into MS' head thus they will integrate the "zune marketplace" as a default song download store and as part of upcoming vista. Then they bundle zune in every vista copy. And just like the pre-installed windows in every new pc, MS will bundle the zune with Dell.
yeah...
"and the government puts fluoride in our water" ( RvB )
dude are you seriously that much of a conspiracy theorist?
Actually it's a pretty documented fact that Microsoft does things like that - they have hired PR firms to write fake letters to the editor praising MS products.
Here's one article about it - http://www.inlumineconsulting.com:80....shilling.html
Also, check out Wikipedia (read the first item under 'Recent Examples) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astroturfing
MS hasn't necessarily placed top priority on design or ease-of-use on Windows, but Windows is not a market failure.
Actually, Windows did put some priority on design and ease-of-use, by imitating the MacOS. One of Bill Gates' most (in)famous quotes was one to his programmers: "That's not what a Mac does. I want Mac on the PC, I want Mac on a PC."
Now, I don't know that they did a particularly great job of imitating the Mac OS, but at least they were copying a well-designed, easy-to-use OS. Windows owes some of its market success to that, plus a variety of other very well-known factors.
Far as the mp3 player space goes, if you honestly think that the iPod's success isn't due in significant part to great design and ease-of-use, you simply haven't been paying attention.
MS has almost always been a catch-up company, and I don't remember Microsoft ever innovating, but they are there. I don't understand why you say Zune isn't leveraging Windows.
How is the Zune leveraging Windows in any major way? Is a shiny new Zune included with every Windows PC? Does iTunes automatically break due to insidious Windows coding? Or, instead, are Windows users perfectly free to use iPods with their Windows PCs, and do so in very large numbers?(hint: The correct answer is 'Yes'). Given that, are you aware of something that no one else is?
Oh and btw, just got back from my last Xmas shopping stop... a GameStop. They were selling Zunes. Oddly, there seemed to be a mini-mountain of them still there, right by the register too, even though its Xmas Eve. I asked the salesguy what was up after buying my game gift:
Me: Hey, how's the Zune selling for ya?
Him: *laughs* It's not.
Me: Yeah. iPod imitation machine, I guess.
Him: Yep. And people know it. No one seems to want one.
Mums and dads could not get the kids away from the 20" and 24" iMacs, they had to pretty much keep saying, "OK I'm going now, I'm going now, last time... I'm going now......." to pull the kids away from the iMac and iPhoto and stuff. The 20" and 23" Cinema Displays totally rocked, they are expensive and you can get cheaper/ better spec'ed stuff, but nothing really as sexy as them....
MS is known for selling hardware at a loss because unlike Apple they understand they are a software, not hardware company.
And what you are failing to realize is that there is no software to sell here. iTunes is given away (as is the Zune software), and Apple does not make significant profits on iTMS. No online music store makes significant profits, and the Zune store is not going to be any different. Eventually MSFT has to make money on the devices themselves.
I'm not sure of too many things they failed at, very few would have predicted the MS would take over Sony and it has, Ps3 will fail and the 360has done very well as an example.
The reason you're not too sure of things they failed at is that you've never heard of them because few people use them (that's why they're failures!). Their list of failures is too long to enumerate and includes the vast majority of the products they ship today. The only true successes they have had have been Windows and Office. Everything else has ranged from a negligible success to unmitigated failure (including the oft-cited XBox - the fact of the matter is that even if 360 outsells PS3, it still is unlikely to ever make enough money to offset the massive losses of the first XBox...and regardless both PS3 and 360 look like they will come in 2nd to the Wii...possibly a distant 2nd).
Don't believe me? Check out MSFT's latest 10-K. Here is all you really need to know:
Total profit in 2006: $16.5 billion
Client Segment Profit (i.e., Windows XP): $10.2 billion
Server and Tools Segment Profit (i.e., Windows Server): $4.3 billion
Information Worker Segment Profit (i.e., Office): $8.3 billion
The fact that those 3 segments already total $6.3 billion of profit MORE than the total profit should be ringing alarm bells - obviously the other segments must be, on net, money losers. And they are. (for those unfamiliar with how businesses run, money losing means NOT SUCCESSFUL)
The other segments - Home & Entertainment, MSN, Business Solutions, and Mobile & Embedded - range from 0 profit (which is actually a loss, after accounting for overhead that is not assigned to any particular division) to $1.3 billion loss (Home & Entertainment). But at least with the XBox/XBox360 you can claim it is early in the second generation and maybe someday will do better. Windows CE/Mobile is on its sixth generation or something like that, MSN (sorry, now "Windows Live") has been around for over a decade...if these things had a good chance of making money, they'd have done it by now.
People keep bringing up Creative Labs thats not a valid comparision, Creative does not have the pure business power that MS has in the market.
Ah, but even with MSFT's willingness to take a loss on the hardware, the Zune is STILL losing quite badly to the 30 GB Creative Zen Vision (as of this post, Zen is #13 on Amazon's electronics list, Zune is #55). Honestly, if anything the Creative comparison is flattering to Zune...they have a lot of ground to go before they can even catch Creative! Forget about the iPod - the relevant question is whether Zune can beat Creative's marketshare before the end of the decade.
MS is like Walmart, Homedepot and Lowes they have such a strong hold on the market they can lose money short term on one product and there overall product line picks up the difference while the competition gets killed off.
You seem very confused - it is Apple that has a strong hold on the MP3 player/online music market, not MS. MS has no hold...that is why they are trying desperate Hail Mary passes like throwing Zune out on the market for a loss. The only "competition" they have any hope of killing off is their PlaysForSure "partners" like Creative. That will be a pretty pyrrhic victory...though at the rate they are going it is doubtful that they will even achieve that.
You seem very confused - it is Apple that has a strong hold on the MP3 player/online music market, not MS. MS has no hold...that is why they are trying desperate Hail Mary passes like throwing Zune out on the market for a loss. The only "competition" they have any hope of killing off is their PlaysForSure "partners" like Creative. That will be a pretty pyrrhic victory...though at the rate they are going it is doubtful that they will even achieve that.
And the scary thing is, MS probably makes money selling their software to Creative yet loses money selling it themselves on their own hardware.