The Zune scandal, the state of the blogosphere and that Mac guy

September 25th, 2006 by Rachelandthecity

This is a long rambling tirade written after 3 beers, but I ain’t going back and editing it now!

Here’s a comment made by one of the other bloggers from the trip on Boudist for a post entitled “The Great Blogging Swindle” that succintly sums up our trip in every way - there is really no need to read any further unless you’re really bored.

Thought I’d jump in here as one of the “co-opted” parties in the Zune junket. First, props to Dan for the well-thought, well-written post. I’ve encountered other blogs who weren’t as polite (making their envy obvious) while questioning our coverage.

I agreed to participate because a) the Zune would interest my readers immensely, b) I’d get a chance to meet other bloggers and c) my site (and the bands we review) would hopefully get some extra exposure.

As a point of full disclosure, here’s what the trip consisted of: airline tickets to Seattle, one night at Hotel Max, transportation to and from Microsoft, taxi vouchers, a Microsoft visitors badge (sticker), Microsoft branded soft drinks, light refreshments, and drinks and dinner. Oh, and a Zune t-shirt and baseball cap. That’s it. No Zune. No software. We couldn’t even take pictures of the Zune.

What did they ask us to do? They asked us NOT to mention anything about any of this until 12pm (EST, USA) September 14, 2006.

That’s it.

In fact, two of the bloggers in attendance (scenestars & tiny mixtapes) STILL haven’t posted word one about the trip. How’s that for sticking it to the man?

I don’t think the Zune coverage changed the personal nature of the blogging space. I actually think it reinforced it. Most of the music blogs who were there made references to the others in attendance and offered their personal takes on the Zune. As for the traditional press outlets, like the Los Angeles Times (who were in attendance at the same junket) they didn’t mention their trip at all. They kept their reviews full of “journalistic integrity.”

Don’t be fooled. A vast majority of product reviews you read about in newspapers and magazines, or see/hear on TV/radio, were somehow supported by the company behind the product. Writers of such reviews often received the product they’re reviewing free of charge. That’s not all. Nabisco pays the grocery store to put that box of Chip Ahoy’s right in front of your nose. Sony pays Best Buy to put Beyoncé on its endcaps (and $100K for front page placement in their weekly flyers). And in the U.S. tobacco companies contribute to BOTH the Republican and Democratic parties. Ladies and gentlemen: Capitalism.

And yes, it’s true, your favorite bloggers probably regularly receive books, gadgets, CDs, concert tickets, backstage passes, meals and more from corporations. It’s those bloggers that can continue to keep such exchanges transparent, honest, personal and immediate. Hopefully, those traits will continue to effect and influence the culture at large.

Okay, let’s talk about Zune, now that everybody has put their opinion on the table. First of all, I realize my post about it is very late on the scene which was directly attributed to circumstance. If I were a more organized person, I would have written something and had it ready on September 14th, the day we all agreed to wait until we posted anything about our trip to Seattle. On that day I set off on a 10 hour drive to Austin to attend ACL. I did not return until late on the 19th and then I immediately had to work on my Commercial Appeal stories and get ready to head to Cincinatti to attend Midpoint Festival from which I returned late last night. Unfortunately, there just wasn’t time on the road to collect my thoughts to make a post until now.

Secondly, let’s talk about why I was invited. I am the token female music blogger on the internet, and because of that I get invited on a lot of “Blogger” trips, so far this year I’ve been on 5. Not that I mind, at all, I’m just putting it out there that I realize it’s not my readership, or my witty writing or my “taste making” skills. Although I do get regular props for not writing about TV shows or the drunken antics of actresses in order ot increase my hit count (Not that there’s anything wrong with that…). This blog is what it is. And the thing is, if I had posted immediately on the Zune, I would have posted exactly what everyone would have expected and just said - “Hey, this thing is like super neato!”

But the backlash, see Stereogum Review and MOKB Review, is forcing me to actually be thoughtful on the whole thing, and that’s really one of the last things I wanna do on this blog. This site is for fun! Yeah, I make a little money, get a few CD’s, get invited to shows and festivals, and get to meet rock stars, and that’s why this site was made, not to do product reviews or to be highly critical of ANYTHING. But also let me say that I have never written about anything because of some swag that I wouldn’t have written about anyway. I’ve missed out on a lot of great music and free shows because I’m too lazy to read my email! I am very self driven and would rather write about Ryan Adams than check out the new red hot Cold War Kids CD that came in the mail. It is not my goal to write about all the latest and greatest, or to be on the front end of anything other than a cold beer, I just write about what I love, and I mostly I write for me, you are just a byproduct. So to think that one meal, a few vodka tonics, a hotel room and a plane trip could get me into bed with… wait a minute - bad analogy… Anyway, no one bought me. And as soon as I have to write an Engadget review, well, just point me towards the blog delete button. And here’s a newsflash, if you think this is the first time bloggers have been given plane rides to cover events, dude, you are so 2004. How do you think some of us went to ACL or Lollapalooza?

Anyway, this one time I guess I’ll put forth some effort, for my loyal readers, all 5 of you. So here are my thoughts, which will make a whole lot more sense if you read the full Stereogum and MOKB posts first because I am not going to regurgitate any of the very comprehensive reviews from those sites.

About 2 weeks before I traveled to Seattle on September 7th, I was contacted by a Zune staffer and asked if I would be interested in coming to The Zune headquarters to preview their new MP3 player. I had read a couple of things online about the “Ipod Killer” and since I am not a huge fan of Apple products - I was definitely intrigued so I said, “But, of course!”

So let me address a couple of points:

As for being bought by Microsoft to give a favorable review of the player, well, thats malarky! I actually think they should have tried harder! I had to be at the airport at the crack of ass Thursday morning to be anally searched for shampoo before boarding a Northwest plane for a four and a half hour flight with no onboard movie or food service (Although, I could have bought an assortment of chips for 5 bucks). Before I left Memphis I was already into my own wallet to kennel my dog for two nights, park at the airport and purchase an assload of overpriced snacks and magazines for the flight. After I finally made it to Seattle, rode to the hotel, checked in and changed, and met up with Amrit and Dodge, we had about an hour to run around the corner to purchase some mall food. We met the other bloggers who were invited from Music For Robots, Tiny Mix Tapes and 3Hive in the lobby right before catching our ride to the Zune offices where we spent the next three hours in meetings. After the roll out, we went back to our hotels, rested for about an hour and then met up with the rest of the press and the Zune staff at a restaurant for drinks and appetizers. I hung out with Amrit, Dodge, and Glen mostly, and chatted with the other blogers a bit. I don’t really remember talking about the Zune much at all. About 11 or so, they closed down the party and I talked Dodge and Amrit into going to have another drink ( you would not believe how hard it is to get bloggers to let loose a little!) while the rest of the bloggers went back to the hotel to crash. We found a bar and had another round and then we went back to the hotel and crashed so that we could get up early, pack our bags and catch a ride to the airport to fly home. It was hardly a vacation and getting to hang with the other bloggers was really the only perk of the trip as I estimate in the end it actually cost me 100 bucks to go.

So, let’s talk about the meetings. We were all extremely tired, but still enthusiastic. First we met Cesar Menendez who writes the Zuneinsider blog. Then we were taken upstairs and given the spill from Chris Stephenson, the Director of Marketing. Now, let me address the neysayers that think that Microsoft tried to sell us on the Zune. Well, of course they did, stupid. That’s the whole point of them making the damn thing right? To sell it? If you have ever sold anything in your life, and believe me I have, the first thing any good company does is put their employees though some seminar that tries to sell them on the product they are being asked to sell. Sales 101.

But that’s just not the whole story. Microsoft has the power and the money behind it to atually hire the people that they believe will really come up with a great product. Why would they try to create anything other than something that blows people away? That wouldn’t be very bright, now would it? And it isn’t hard to see why they picked Chris Stephenson, an Austrailian ex-pat that looked like a 40-year-old kid in jeans and a ragged striped polo that looked like it came straight off the rack at Sears. And that’s not a snarky comment about his wardrobe, just that he obviously has a lot of other stuff on his mind. You know those guys. Anyway, the guy came off as very genuine. He was brought over to the Zune Project from Xbox and asked to make a cool MP3 player. And that is exactly what he set out to do.

What is lacking in the current generation of players? What would make them better? How do we give people what they want and still follow the standards set by the RIAA? How do we make our player function better, look better, what kind of content can be added, how can we let people share content?

These are all questions that were clearly considered by the Zune staff. And obviously, they have parameters to work within. It’s more complicated than all the geniuses over in the Stereogum comments think. I do not even follow the whole DRM debate, but I do know that Sirius radio was sued because they added a record feature to their radios. So, there are laws in place and Zune has tried to circumvent them in as many creative ways as possible. In other words, I just don’t beleive that when they were designing the Zune they were trying to figure out how they could fuck the consumer by wrapping files in DRM or making people pay for a subscription service. I may be naive, but I think their intention is to give you as many options to share and listen to music as possible within the guidelines set up outside of their control.

As for the whole debate on whether this player will make a dent in the ipod’s share of the market. You wanna know what I think? I DON’T CARE. Not one iota. Not one little bit. NOT AT ALL. And why should anyone? I have three MP3 players right now. I have a Napster To Go (that was FREE, from Napster, cause they advertised on this site! Ha ha!), I have an Ipod shuffle (That was a re-gift from Richens that I would have never paid money for), and I have a Samsung 1GB that doubles as a voice recorder. Never once have I weighed which one is doing better in the marketplace or has sold more or looks cooler, cause, let me reiterate, I DON’T CARE. I don’t care what Apple or Microsoft’s shares or profits or whatever are. And I actually really don’t care what their business practices are. If I had to boycott every comapny with unethical business practices, I’d be living in a hut made of figs in the dessert with no shoes or underwear. And I will never get into a discussion to try and figure out how either of their new products will sell, casue did I mention, I don’t care? I also don’t play fantasy baseball. Fucking staticians.

So what did I think about the Zune? Well, I thought it was neato.

Seriously, I use Microsoft Media Player - everyday! And I like it. I like the way it is set up and I like the pretty pictures of the albums. This is what’s cool about the Zune: instead of a gray screen when a song plays the full album cover pops up on the screen. I liked the 3:4 screen size and the video looked very high res. Since I’ve never owned a real Ipod, the buttons aren’t hard for me to figure out and don’t feel awkward. I also did not have any problem with it’s size. I like the idea of pointing my player at the cute boy in the coffee shop and perusing his playlists. I’m fine with someone sending me some songs for three pays or three days. I suggested they add a feature where you can generate specific playlists based on “most listened” to songs in a week or a month, or generate a playlist based on song ratings, then if someone asks you what you have been listening to lately, you can instantly generate a playlist full of Black Crowes songs and zap it to them instead of lying about how much you love the new Cold War Kids.

If it’s a file that’s free and clear and I like it, I can have the file sharer email it to me or go to the band’s website and download it. As a matter of fact, this builds community because you are forced to actually talk to the person to find out more about the music rather than them just zapping you aome songs and you never really having to talk to them again. If it’s not free and clear, it can easily be found on El.bows or soulseek. I mean come on, all the people that are crying about DRM, heyzeus christ! If you want the fucking song for free, you can find the fucking song for free. Don’t be a douchebag. Ooops, too late!

As for my con list, well, as I also told the staffers at Zune, the sharing aspect isn’t gonna be a big selling point for folks like me for a while. Living in Memphis, I think I know about 5 people that own Mp3 players, and since we tend to drive most places, it’s not like I am using mine at the same time someone else is using theirs, like, ever.

Which brings me to a whole other stupid argument that popped up in the Stereogum comments. People in big cities are so out of touch…Here is some breaking news for New Yorkers and Californians. There are actually a whole lot of people inbetween you guys. Many of them not only still don’t know what a blog is, they don’t even own a computer! The price range for these two gadgets are still way too high for a lot of people to purchase, just like televisions used to be a total luxury. So, in reality, the marketplace is still wide open for everyone, and the true “Ipod Killer” may be one that hasn’t even been developed yet.

But in the meantime - Applebots - man your stations!

In total serendipitous news, last Monday night when I was still in Austin, after I went to see Cat Power and Joanna Newsom, I went to meet my friends Joe and Palli at Beerland for Rock and Roll Karaoke. I wasn’t surprised to see Sam Rockwell on hand as he had been hanging out at ACL with my friends all weekend. I was surprised when he did a dead on James Brown impersonation with backing vocals from Benjamin Hotchkiss of The Real Heroes and Shane Lawlor of IV Thieves. Then I was introduced to Justin Long, who I had no idea was an actor until after we had danced all over the bar together and he asked me to make out. (He was totally kidding!)

Then today I realized where I knew him from, he’s The Mac Guy. I’m glad I didn’t realize who he was when I was buying him a car bomb. I was totally drunk enough to have told him how much I hate those commercials.