Their motto should be “Because you’re too stupid to remember the last time we screwed you.”
by schwim on Apr.30, 2008, under MPAA & RIAA, Music
During one of my light reading sessions in the bathroom yesterday(what, I know I’m not the only one.), I was reading this month’s WIRED magazine. During my reading, I actively try to ignore the ads in the page, just to spite the company that so shamelessly packs more ads than content into their magazine, but one ad slipped by. It was for the Microsoft Zune.
You might remember that very recently, Microsoft announced that it would be shutting down the DRM servers for the now defunct MSN Music and any music purchased through that service would no longer be able to be moved to other computers(or reactivated if you upgraded your current computer). This meant that all the customers that bought music through the MSN Music service got the shaft. Big time. That’s what you get for renting music.
Fresh on the heels of that announcement, Microsoft began heavily advertising the music collection you could rent via “Zune Pass”. For less than the price of a CD per month (if you purchase cd’s for the ridiculous MSRP), then you can borrow millions of songs, from thousands of artists. You don’t actually get to do what you’d like to with the music, you just rent it. Kind of like satellite radio, I guess only with the added benefit of typical MS bloatware and the hassle of dealing with DRM approved players and such.
Initially, Zune’s giant-killing feature was going to be the ability for the Zune to “share” data with other nearby Zunes. The problem is, people aren’t willing to buy the player in numbers large enough for the suckers owners to find others that made the same mistake in the immediate vicinity, so the ads that touted that feature were quietly swept under the carpet.
So, the whole “Zune social network” thing didn’t fly and instead, they’ve begun pushing a music service shortly after shafting all of their customers that bought into their last music service. They’re hoping of course that you don’t notice. If you did happen to notice, Rob Bennett of Microsoft wants you to know that they wanted you to have DRM free music. It was the labels that didn’t want you to have it. As Rob so smoothly put it:
“We want to make it easy and as painless for our customers as possible. We really feel, in the long term, what’s best for people who want to buy music from Microsoft is to move to Zune.”
They’re doing everything they do for you, the consumer. No need to thank them.
The tears in your eyes are thanks enough.
