I know someone with the Blackberry logo tattooed on their hand. Even though Blackberry's are still being made, I think that it's worse than that Zune tattoo.
The market for $200 MP3 players mostly dried up (due to HDD/flash memory getting cheaper, pushing what were $200 players down to $50, and the rise of smartphones). Unless you're Apple, it's practically impossible to sell them at that price.
Only the physical Zune player is dead. The desktop software, Windows Phone 7 software, and Xbox Live Marketplace integration live on.
It's not awful (Zune is holding its own against non-Apple players), but with a quick back of the envelope calculation I estimate iPods outselling zunes at least 20:1 (http://tinyurl.com/47x4rv3). Nobody wants to be in 9th place :).
Tepid interest, apparently. I think the market might be saturated or people might be using their phones instead of portable media players. Everyone I've talked to has had a relatively positive experience with their zune. I have a first gen 30GB model that I got used that's still alive and kicking. I don't purchase music through their store but the Zune was the right price at the right time and I've never really been too concerned about what the cool kids with their iPods thought of my slightly clunky Zune. It plays music, it takes a beating and its cheap.
I never saw one in the wild, neither in SF nor Seattle.
I think it died because from the beginning the perception was like getting the Dodge Neon instead of the Honda Civic. Also with iTunes in the national lexicon, who wanted to be left out? "Thanks for the iTunes gift card, Grandma. Maybe we can spend it at the Zune Marketplace."
I always hated this thing, I think mostly just because of the name- Something about it is just so contrived, so "board room" it just pained me to hear it.
I have a Zune (16gb), my partner has a Zune, and there's one that's the house Zune. The house Zune was my first one, which I got for free from a guy I know from Microsoft who was given it as a reward for shipping early. The second Zune I bought because, well, I liked the Zune and wanted more storage. The 2nd gen Zune was a good, well designed MP3 player. Too bad it's not worth much for a product to just an MP3 player any more. The Zune desktop software sucks less than iTunes (which, let's face it, is a real pain in the ass), and the all-you-can eat model of the Zune marketplace is better than iTune's $0.99 or whatever it is now per song. I'm still thinking about getting the HD Zune at some point because I like having just a straight MP3 player, I'm well invested in the Zune marketplace at this point, and I am not going to buy a Windows 7 Phone any time soon (not as long as I have my iPhone...)
That's slightly lame. I saw a model released shortly before everything went touchscreen (I think?), and it was slick. The lack of a touchscreen was made up for with clickable directional touchpad thing, and the menus were all fadey and such.
I guess Windows Phone 7 is effectively Microsoft's new Zune line now.
Please, please open the device up before you stop supporting it. When you sync images to the device they get resized to the native resolution. This means when you "zoom" in on a photo, it looks like crap. Why even have a zoom function?
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 66.8 ms ] threadOnly the physical Zune player is dead. The desktop software, Windows Phone 7 software, and Xbox Live Marketplace integration live on.
I guess Windows Phone 7 is effectively Microsoft's new Zune line now.