What the Heck is up With Zune?

Welp, no doubt the news in Zuneland (pronounced “zoon-lund”) hasn’t been great as of late. With the economy tanking and news that Zune device sales have plummeted, all signs lead to a questionable future for Zune. And with the departure of Zune’s own ZuneInsider (Cesar, you will be sorely missed), people are already believing and bracing for the worst, but allow me to shed some light on this bleakness, explain what went wrong (in my opinion), and speculate on where Zune’s headed next, which you may be glad to know is not into oblivion, just not how you may want or expect it.

What Happened?

When you step into the ring with heavy weights, you’d better be able to beat them at their game, or bring something that is game-changing. Zune, for all its tout as being an iPod killer, has simply (and discouragingly) not been that. Why? Let’s face it. Apple had this market cornered, and if Microsoft was going to put a dent into it, it needed to play Apple’s game and beat them at it to make any progress in device sales (which again tanked compared to the previous year). So what does that mean? Apple has had the distinction, whether you like it or not, of always bringing new models of iPods to market almost every year. This creates that lust for the “latest and greatest”; that instant demand that sends the masses out with credit cards in hand, ready to buy. Zune, in comparison did not refresh its device models this past year, and there’s why the sales were flat. Zune simply didn’t play their hand right.

Apple also prides itself on having the thinnest, funnest (yes, they actually use that exact term), sleekest, and sexiest products out there, and people know this and believe it. This is also where Zune really lacked in comparison. I’ve heard the Zune is a tank – no one can argue that – it’s really durably made, but sexy? Lustful? The design of the Zune device does leave one peering down the aisle and seeing what the iPods look like. Why?

The PDMP market (which stands for Personal Digital Music Player) is nothing BUT personal. The player you use, whether you like it or not, says something about you. It defines you, and testifies for you on your behalf in this consumerist’s age, and while I bought Zune simply because it wasn’t an iPod, many more bought an iPod for that exact same reason. Zune’s device sales have plummeted because there were no new Zunes last year, and Apple refreshed its entire line – of course people are going to opt for the newest thang.

This past October, with Zune 3.0 coming out, it was more about the service. People were trying down-play the need for hardware and say it’s the service that was going to push Zune. But I respectfully (and still) disagreed. Zune has always been perceived as a hardware competitor to iPod. Trying to change it up and emphasize services seemed going backwards, not forwards. And even if it were true that the service was what Zune was going to be all about, Zune already wasn’t bringing anything new, and was never leading in the “discovery” experience anyhow; not with the huge success of services such as Pandora, Slacker, and LastFM, again Zune appeared to be a reiteration and not a game changer.

Microsoft woulda, coulda, shoulda brought something game-changing instead, which I believe they initially tried to do with the larger screen and wi-fi capability, but it was too little too late. Zune was completely blindsided by the likes of the iPod Touch and other services such as Pandora and Slacker, which have revolutionized the game and left Microsoft clamoring.

So What’s Next?

Zune (In my honest opinion) is not going away. Not for now anyway. There are a couple roads Microsoft can take here, some of which you may like, and some you may not.

The first would be to slow down, regroup, and rethink things through. The device market is a finicky one and they lust after that top new device (even in a recession people are still buying gadgets), so a major and complete redesign of the Zune device would be in order. But this is if Microsoft is willing to put the R&D into something that will truly be at the level (or more) of the iPod Touch. It’s a tall order, so will we ever see a touch screen Zune? Well we may, but I’m thinking it may not be in the way we imagine it. Zune could be on a touch screen cell phone, but manufactured by HTC – which brings me to the next alternative.

The second road would be that Zune would pull out of the hardware manufacturing completely, and simply offer its services across other MS platforms such as Xbox and Windows Mobile. There’s been speculation about this recently, however, even with promises of not stopping hardware – it’s hard to tell just how much MS is committed to going the long-haul against Apple. We may see Zune diminished to compete just against Pandora and comparable services.

What’s my take? I think it will be a mixture of both. I think we’ll see at least one more Zune device, but we’ll also see Zune start its migration over to other platforms. Eventually, the cell phone will replace the stand alone PDMP so this is a wise move. But for now, I’m looking forward to one last hoorah with a new Zune model, but hey Microsoft, if you want to avoid sales numbers like we just saw last quarter, you need to beat Apple at their game (at least in the minds of us consumers out here).

Hope that puts to rest some fears out there. I, for one, was pretty down over the past month or so with all the crap happening with Zune, but I think things will get better. Things will turn around and Zune will gain its luster one way or another. So here’s to a brighter future, and one we can look forward to with hope and optimism…. Let’s hope…