Thursday, November 02, 2006

zune and the high end market

One problem that Microsoft's zune player will face is that apple has already captured a large portion of the high end consumers. The ones who are willing to pay for the convenience of using itunes. These consumers are largely locked in because songs bought through itunes won't play on other players without some effort. (for instance burning and then ripping the songs as mp3s). However some people think Microsft may try to buy these users out by giving them free copies of songs they bought on itunes. While I think this is a good idea, it exemplifies how hard it is going to be for anyone to compete with the ipod. Even if they are free I hope they make it quick and easy to download all the songs.