Jobs on Zune's Sharing: Too Slow

[Darius Wey]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15262121/site/newsweek/page/3/' target='_blank'>http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15262121/site/newsweek/page/3/</a><br /><br /></div><span style="font-style: italic;">&quot;I've seen the demonstrations on the Internet about how you can find another person using a Zune and give them a song they can play three times. It takes forever. By the time you've gone through all that, the girl's got up and left! You're much better off to take one of your earbuds out and put it in her ear. Then you're connected with about two feet of headphone cable.&quot;</span><br /> <br /> That's a quote from Newsweek's interview with Apple's head honcho, Steve Jobs. While the Zune's wireless sharing feature is a little crippled in its current form, I do think it has potential, yet Apple appears to not even embrace the concept. Could this say something about future iPods? Will they never incorporate any sort of sharing capabilities?

[Vincent M Ferrari]

Keep in mind, the lord and master Steve Jobs, producer of all things brilliant and amazing (praise be upon him, Steve) has started investing his company in the 802.11N market which is infinitely faster than B and G. Now, does that mean an iPod with N is coming? No, but it does raise the possibility because you're going to have the iTV (barring some miracle it'll have N) and the new iMacs (reports are surfacing that their built-in Airport card is N) using the technology, it would almost make sense that he's downplaying the sharing on the Zune because an N device is in the works from the mecca of half-eaten fruit.

Of course this is rampant speculation, but Steve is a very calculated guy, and when he says something like, "it's slow," it's not just because he thinks "it's slow," but probably more like, "it's slow, and what we're doing is much faster."

If history is any indication, this is going to prove to be a prophetic statement on Apple's future for wireless in iPods.

[DesertLarry]

Steve obviously does not have problems with ear wax like many of us do. Nobody wants to share one of my earbuds :o

[dorelse]

Yeah...same thought here. Apple will of course come out with their own version where Apple 'Does it Right'.

Until then, he'll say how bad everyone else's is.

[Aaron Roma]

While N is faster, it's hardly _infintely_ faster than G. G, especially at the distances that the Zune is designed for, should work just fine for it's sharing capabilities. I would think that if the sharing features of the Zune are slow, it would be because of the actuall process of sharing, rather than the wireless standard it's using. Besides, would N be a poor choice for such a device? Would not the MIMO technology of N be a bigger power drain on already power sensitive devices?

[Vincent M Ferrari]

It's not infinitely faster. Sorry, I have a tendency to overstate things. It's at the very least twice as fast in the real world, and something tells me that they aren't using G, they're using B, in which case it's quite a bit faster.

That being said, we don't know what's coming down the pike. N might be a big drain, but who would've thought G would be showing up in Pocket PC type devices? Or phones?!

We don't know everything, but we do know one thing. Steve Jobs doesn't knock something unless he has something better up his sleeve and while MIMO may be a big power drain, nothing says it has to be on all the time, only when sharing. Just because the Zune sits there in promiscuous mode, doesn't mean competitors are gonna buy into that model.

Who knows. Speculation is fun, though.

[Sage]

I don't think Mr. Jobs is talking about the speed of the actual transfer when he says that it's slow, I believe he's referring to the complexity and number of menus that need to be traversed in order to send the file.

A point well made, but you wouldn't expect him to be praising his rival anyway. :)

[Jason Dunn]

The harsh reality of Zune sharing is one that few people seem to be talking about: the Zune's sharing abilities are useless unless another Zune is nearby. It's the value of the network. Front-page post time...

[Vincent M Ferrari]

I was steering clear of that lest someone accuse me of Apple fanboyism. :D

[Aaron Roma]

I don't think Mr. Jobs is talking about the speed of the actual transfer when he says that it's slow, I believe he's referring to the complexity and number of menus that need to be traversed in order to send the file.


Without having seen it myself, that's my gut feeling too...

[Vincent M Ferrari]

I have to say, they showed it in a promotional video and it didn't look too onerous to me...

[Jason Dunn]

I have to say, they showed it in a promotional video and it didn't look too onerous to me...

I'd have to agree - it really doesn't look that bad. The PMC is a really great UI for the most part...

[Vincent M Ferrari]

Just to be sure, I went back and watched the walkthrough again, and Steve has to be talking about bandwidth. To share song it's literally three clicks.

Click on the song
Click on the Send menu item
Click the Zune you want to send it to.

I can't imagine that getting any easier, so I seriously doubt that he's talking about how complicated the process is.

[Jason Dunn]

I can't imagine that getting any easier, so I seriously doubt that he's talking about how complicated the process is.

Actually, I think that's exactly what he's talking about: when have you ever seen Jobs be rational about non-Apple products? You know he thinks everything sucks - I've never seen him do anything BUT trash-talk non-Apple products.

[Janak Parekh]

Just to be sure, I went back and watched the walkthrough again, and Steve has to be talking about bandwidth. To share song it's literally three clicks. Well, by Apple standards, three clicks is probably too much. ;)

Anyway, there have been a ton of reasons given for why Steve said what he said. Amongst others, he's giving a vote of confidence to his investors, who don't want to hear that Apple is running scared. I'm pretty sure that Apple has been testing wireless technologies; after all, the Mac line is one of the few that has had Bluetooth 2.0+EDR implemented across the entire product spectrum for the last year-plus, not to mention the work they've done with AirPort, AirPort Express, etc.

--janak

[Vincent M Ferrari]

Well, by Apple standards, three clicks is probably too much.

Well, we do like our Macs to read minds, Janak... :D

[rzanology]

listen....i saw the demo...i'd say they pulled the song down in about 10 seconds. thats not bad at all. had you dowbnload that song it would take the same 10 seconds. SO why is it slow??? i dont get it. WHen people think of sharing files from mobile devices they think bluetooth. Not wifi! And here we have it...the NEXT wave of sharing...a whole song can be shared in 10 seconds. how the hell is that slow. This is the reason i cannot stand jobs and his cult. This is much like the 360...from the sony bench all you heard was "oooh they can't even make enough of it....and look...they're offering two diffrent ones??? thats DUMB!" now....low and behold....sony is doing the same...and they too are having problems pushing out a decnt amount of ps3s to the people. Here comes jobs...."oooh thats slow" why is it slow jobs? is it because microsoft beat you to it? What if creative had this on a zen....would it be slow too? Madness!!!!


sorry...just had to vent.

[Janak Parekh]

listen....i saw the demo...i'd say they pulled the song down in about 10 seconds. thats not bad at all. had you dowbnload that song it would take the same 10 seconds. SO why is it slow??? i dont get it. WHen people think of sharing files from mobile devices they think bluetooth. Not wifi!
Actually, the average consumer thinks of swapping earbuds, which takes a second.

Anyway, in my opinion, the 3 plays/3 days/no passing around is the fundamental problem. The transfer time is so-so, but the limitations on playback make it virtually worthless in my opinion. 3 plays is nowhere near enough to determine if I like something or not.

And, of course, there's the fact that Jason pointed out -- you need to beam to someone that only has a Zune. If we didn't have DRM, I'd love to have seen a standard music sharing spec so we could see this implemented across different types of devices...

--janak

[Vincent M Ferrari]

The DRM application thing bothers the hell out of me. In Microsoft's defense, that's still a rumor right now and has yet to be confirmed one way or the other solidly (unless I'm mistaken) so that may not happen.

That being said, as a content producer myself, my work is licensed under a CC license, and if they apply DRM to it while someone shares it, that's a violation of the license on the content. I have a feeling a lot of content producers are going to rally against the Zune solely on those grounds, and that could be devastating for Microsoft.

[rzanology]

hmmmm....i just thought of something. what about songs i rip myself? they dont have drm. will those two be flagged as 3 days/3 times?

[Vincent M Ferrari]

Yep. At least if the popular understanding is true.

[rzanology]

now THAT could be a huge problem!

[Janak Parekh]

That being said, as a content producer myself, my work is licensed under a CC license, and if they apply DRM to it while someone shares it, that's a violation of the license on the content. I have a feeling a lot of content producers are going to rally against the Zune solely on those grounds, and that could be devastating for Microsoft. Yup, this has been under extensive discussion (http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1293) -- take a look. From my quick scanning, it won't be a legally-prosecutable CC violation, but it's not so nice either...

--janak

[Vincent M Ferrari]

Maybe we should just ignore the DRM on Microsoft's store. Surely that's just not being nice, too :-)

This is the problem with our modern digital distribution system. Whether you want to be or not, your content can be munged anyway they want to. :mad: