Microsoft Makes It Official: Welcome to the Social

[Darius Wey]

<em>&quot;Celebrating the U.S. launch of the new Zune&trade; digital media player and music service, Microsoft Corp. has worked with a number of cutting-edge artists to stage free concerts in public parks and plazas in urban centers across the country. Today at Westlake Park in downtown Seattle at the first of these Zune concerts, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates took the stage to share his excitement for this next step Microsoft is taking in music and entertainment. Gates outlined the Zune vision to create new ways for people to connect, discover and share music and entertainment experiences. He was joined onstage by John Richards, morning show host of popular community radio station KEXP, to showcase the new Zune-to-Zune wireless sharing feature. Richards wirelessly sent the inaugural song to Gates, who then surprised the crowd by giving away his Zune device to a member of the audience. Building on the &ldquo;Hello from Seattle&rdquo; greeting printed on the back of every Zune device, Richards created a playlist to celebrate Seattle music in honor of the Zune launch. The complete KEXP &ldquo;Hello from Seattle&rdquo; playlist will be available on Zune Marketplace for consumers to download.&quot;</em><br /><br />The official Zune launch is just a couple of hours away, and well, you know how it goes. Things don't feel official without some official PRs from the company itself. If you're interested in checking them out, hit PressPass for one about the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2006/nov06/11-13ZuneLaunchPR.mspx">launch</a> and one about the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2006/nov06/11-13Zune.mspx">&quot;social&quot;</a>. The second PR is very focused on the concept of &quot;future-proofing&quot;. Microsoft wants you to know that despite some current limitations, the Zune will be upgradeable. We've seen this happen over the past year with the Xbox 360, and with the same team working on the Zune, I do believe that it'll be given the same sort of treatment.<br /><br />So, folks, the Zune will be available from 30,000 US retailers. Tell us if you'll be picking up one (or two or three) tomorrow.

[Aaron Roma]

I'll have my nice new brown Zune in my possesion in just about two and a half hours. :)

[jdmountford]

Well, PR rallies are great. I was waiting for the Zune Experience to come through <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comhttp://forums.thoughtsmedia.com/ /><st1:City w:st=Denver</ST1:place</st1:City>
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<st1:City w:st="on"></st1:City>Zune Experience, you ask... OK well I had hope.

Anyway, I am looking forward to a getting a Zune, but it will have to wait as we are allocating funds to the Holidays and possibly a new vehicle.

<O:pI will just have to drool over every one else’s.

<O:pAnd the Brown is so pretty. Well all of the colors are nice, but the brown is unordinary which is a cool of it's own.<O:p

[samt]

Well,

After drooling over the Zune feature-set, I'm just glad I don't have to justify the amount of money for TWO or THREE since they're not yet available in Australia. This time I didn't even bother trying with the online stores whether someone would ship overseas by 'accident.'

Sincerely hope that MS keep to their "social" aspect here in the Pasifika and have local/Aust/NZ bands on the thing instead of the American bands. That would be worth the ticket of admittance.

ciao,


Sam T.