Whoa, Zune Is Social

My huge gripe with Zune had been incompatibility—that the device and content from Microsoft's music store don't work with the company's other stuff. Zune was supposed to be a closed system like Apple's iPod and iTunes, which doesn't make a helluva lot of sense, given Microsoft's broader entertainment strategy. Suddenly, however, Zune is social with some other Microsoft products.

On Saturday, I popped a DVD into my Windows Vista notebook, which launched Windows Media Player 11. I haven't yet obtained Vista updated versions of third-party DVD playback software, such as WinDVD, so WMP 11 does the job. For a brief moment, as the media player launched, I spied a bunch of album covers before the DVD started to play. My WMP 11 library should have been empty. So back I went to look and discovered that Windows Media Player had added all my Zune music—stuff obtained through the subscription service—to the library.

"You don't suppose?" I wondered. Sure enough, WMP 11 would play music obtained from the Zune Marketplace. Whoa. I got the same result from Windows Media Center. Whoa.

The big test—the one I expected to be a bust—got nowhere. I wanted to sync music from the WMP 11 library with my Samsung BlackJack cell phone, which runs Windows Mobile 5, and see if the content would play. But I could never get the BlackJack and Windows Vista to sync together. They used to be quite friendly using Windows Mobile Device Center. No more. Zune Marketplace software could be the reason.

The ability to play Zune content on other devices would be huge. Still, support by other Microsoft software is pretty damn big. It's game changing, in fact, making Zune a much better fit with Microsoft's broader entertainment strategy. Zune and the Zune Marketplace would fill the void blown open by iPod, at least on the technology side. Catching up with iPod/iTunes as competitive products is another matter, however.

Strange, every review I read about Zune said the same thing: that Windows Media Audio DRM 9.1 used for the Zune store content is incompatible with WMP 11. My experience is contradictory. Is Windows Vista different, or could Microsoft have issued a compatibility update? Those are among the questions I'll be asking Microsoft tomorrow, once the holiday madness is finally passed. I haven't tested Zune Marketplace on Windows XP, but it's reasonable to assume similar results.

Zune Markeplace is plenty good enough for me. I wouldn't use WMP 11. But Zune Marketplace content played in Windows Media Center would be most appealing. It's good for Microsoft, too, as it levels the content playing field with former PlaysForSure partners and beats out Apple, which doesn't provide a utility for playing iTunes content through the Windows Media Player user interface.

All that Apple DRM content is a problem for Microsoft, if Media Center is the centerpiece of its living room strategy and iTunes content won't play there. Zune is one way Microsoft can recapture this important entertainment endpoint from Apple.

We'll hear more from Apple about its broader entertainment strategy next week at Macworld, me thinks. Next week's event would be the right time for Apple to really show off its new home entertainment/networking hub, dubbed iTV. Apple has already seeded millions of Windows PCs—not just Macs—for the new device. The network stack already should be there in iTunes, or at least its makings, with Bonjour.

Microsoft may have had the first "welcome to my social" word with Zune. But I expect Apple's social announcement is soon coming.

I will continue my Zune testing, which demonstrates the importance of review units. The Zune is mine, a Christmas present purchased from Target. I'm more referring to those laptops Microsoft sent to the bloggers that caused so much ruckus. I see the loaners as huge opportunity for people to try out the stuff. Otherwise, the only word they have on how things work is that of the company or other users and reviewers at places like eWEEK Labs. Testing cuts through the marketing propaganda and misinformation.