05-07-2008, 09:00 AM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Zune Team Further Restricts Non-US Users: Please, Someone Stop The Insanity
"The Microsoft Zune team has officially become “region control” extremists. First, they locked down the Zune Originals site with geographic IP blocking so you couldn’t even fantasize about the cool and stylish new Zunes if you didn’t live in the United States. If that wasn’t enough, they’re also blocking enthusiasts from populating their Zune Card with play lists. Now comes a third restriction which hides the Zune Marketplace in the latest version (2.5) of the Zune software. If you installed version 2.5 of the Zune Software and you don’t live in the United States, this is what you see. There is no “Marketplace” button in the menu bar."
This is getting ridiculous. Long Zheng, who's based in Australia, noticed that when he installed the Zune 2.5 software update, his Marketplace tab vanished. So did our very own Darius Wey, who also happens to live in Australia. The Zune team, in some bizarre fit of needing to control the Zune experience even more tightly, is making that tab vanish if your computer is set to any regional setting other than "United States". That's right, it's the same blockade that the Zune team put up to block the inclusion of our song plays. This is an arbitrary and silly restriction of course, because I have a Zune account that works, with points that I can use to purchase songs, and I'm not in the United States. Sure, I had to jump through some hoops to get that far, but it's possible.
The solution is exactly the same: on a Vista-based computer, go into your control panel, then look for the Regional and Language Options. Select the Location tab and change the Current Location to United States. You may need to reboot your computer, but the next time you load the Zune software, it will display the Marketplace tab. If you're on a Windows XP-based system, the solution is nearly identical.
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05-07-2008, 02:12 PM
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Banned
Join Date: Dec 2007
Posts: 372
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you'd think with a team full of marketing hacks they would have been able to resolve pesky licensing issues....they certainly can't do anything else.
it is a sad sad shame that with an army of programmers at Microsoft they can't execute techical innovation on the Zune. I think the Zune team is where microsoft sends its flunkies.
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05-07-2008, 04:41 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Wow. You've really got your hate on for the Zune. Relax man, it's just an gadget. 
Quote:
Originally Posted by inteller
you'd think with a team full of marketing hacks they would have been able to resolve pesky licensing issues....they certainly can't do anything else.
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I think this is much less about marketing issues than it is about legal issues - delays in music licensing is usually about lawyers, not marketing people.
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05-08-2008, 11:39 PM
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Neophyte
Join Date: May 2008
Posts: 1
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i'm in the US and never use Marketplace, so i tried to do the OPPOSITE -- i changed my region setting to Japan (used to live there) and rebooted. but i still have the marketplace clogging up my experience, making teh software load slower. 
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05-09-2008, 04:40 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Quote:
Originally Posted by poipoipoi
but i still have the marketplace clogging up my experience, making teh software load slower. |
I'm curious, what makes you believe that the software loads slower? The marketplace tab should have zero effect on the software until you click on it, then you may see the Zune "wait" logo as it loads the Marketplace content...
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05-10-2008, 05:38 PM
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Developer & Designer, News Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 12,959
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jason Dunn
This is getting ridiculous.
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Couldn't agree more. I still have my region set to Australia for all the local content. When it comes to accessing the Marketplace, I'm manually switching to and from the United States. It couldn't get any more tedious.
I'm just glad that they haven't restricted software updates to the United States. But the scary thing is it just might happen.
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05-10-2008, 05:41 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Darius Wey
I'm just glad that they haven't restricted software updates to the United States. But the scary thing is it just might happen.
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Yeah, who knows how far they'll go next - it's so bizarre and frustrating. 
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