Zune: Nice Spot, Crap Hardware

Posted by Justin Cone

Microsoft recently posted a really nice spot promoting their new Zune player. Too bad the player itself is a DRM whore. Typical Microsoft antics.

zune.jpg

One thing I find amusing about Microsoft’s buzz campaign is that their logo is nowhere to be found on the Coming Zune site. This conspicuous absence belies a simple fact: Microsoft’s brand is its own worst enemy, at least when it comes to selling music players to tech-savvy kids. That makes me laugh.

Anyone know who did the spot? The spot was directed, designed and animated by the good people at Motion Theory.

Thanks, Daniel

About the author

Justin Cone

/ justincone.com
Together with Carlos El Asmar, Justin co-founded Motionographer, F5 and The Motion Awards. He currently lives in Austin, Texas with is wife, son and fluffball of a dog. Before taking on Motionographer full-time, Justin worked in various capacities at Psyop, NBC-Universal, Apple, Adobe and SCAD.
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13 Comments

vancer

My friend Mark Kulakoff (https://kulakoff.com) designed everything. I believe the folks at Motion Theory animated it though… (?)

Yeah, its a cool little spot.

deathtoprint

It’s so halarious, like you said, microsofts own image is it’s worst selling point. I think it’s time for a revision of the logo, i can’t stand those colors they have now.

I love motion theory though, this is a clean piece. The only thing I would even possibly consider buying from microsoft, would be a dope Portable Media Player, that had atleast a 60gb drive, and a 720x480p display.

Then… MAYBE, id consider buying it, but i’m sure there’d be a reason not to.

2pop

It was done by Motion Theory. There were over a dozen people who worked on it. I have a friend Ron Delizo that was one of the designers.

vancer

I take back my mistaken “designed everything” then. heh

deathtoprint

The piece is nice.

I know this is for discussion of the motion graphics… but…

did anyone notice how poorly designed the actual site is. The pre-loads are blank, don’t tell you much, and the site just seems so “1991”. Im not sure how they expect people to want to share the site…let alone buy something from them… it’s kinda bland.

THA_DON

mmmmm, thats funny, i would have said “1993” myself…. but whats two years between friends?

i am still trying to figure out why the western world loves things dieing, killing eachother or anything brutal in general. Thats why i prefer watching STASH, there is a lot of foriegn work that doesnt think violence is “cool”
Like the recent G4 bumbers of things cutting heads off and whatnot, what gives?

Basically two brids catching on fire for no reason is kinda dumb for me. i like good concept, story telling and an occasional twist thrown in there… call me normal or old fashioned your pick.

lets, what will i do for my next spot, im trying to sell an Mp3 Player, or promote a new show, heck it doesnt even matter, thrown in some dude getting hit by a car, my tell someone on a bus to start fighting an old man, order a girl to bang her head on a piano, brilite, ah, good brainstorm right there… “awesome!!!”

Sir Monkey

WOW, crazy, I actually agree with THA_DON for the first time ever!!! Well, not the STASH part but I do agree with the western world comment, it is very true. It’s especially true with commercials, europeans tend to use sex as a selling vehicle and the US tends to use lots of violence as a selling point, pretty freakin sad if you ask me. Oh how Bush and the FCC are best friends. They will air most violent situations on TV but OMG, Janet Jacksons tit flies out for 15 frames and all holy tv hell breaks out, so so stupid.

mmmmmmmmm, which one do you prefer, something sexy or violent?

It’s nice to see Apple has never used the violence gimmck as a selling point?

Apple = Good taste
Microsoft = Bad taste

opus13

“Too bad the player itself is a DRM whore.” as opposed to…? everything you buy is locked down, and the media isnt transportable. sounds like a certain fruit based company i’ve heard of.

rolin

That’s an interesting point.
USA vs. Europe .. violence vs. sex.

Therefore I’m happy to be here in Europe. ;)

Another remarkably thing imho is,
that Microsoft ditributes their viral videos*
coded as H.264 packed in a Quicktime movie file.
This seems to me like a silent concession,
that their own codecs (or video formats)
are not as wide spread as some might think.

Or it’s just to aim also at us innocent Mac/iPod users.

*there is also a much less violent one,
you guys surely know, under
https://www.comingzune.com/video/zune01.mov

Supernova

Indeed crappy hardware. Twice as thick as the 30gb ipod and thicker than the 60gb/ 80gb ipod too. Only 12h music (3.5h video) batterylife while the ipod is 20h (6.5 video). Seems like ms is comingzune a little too late.

But i do like teh zune clips a lot

deathtoprint

Maybe microsoft thinks that because they now have invaded the apple market they can now start using quicktime files, because everyone knows how many problems you encounter w/ windows formats on the web, pc, etc. They’re a pain in the ass and there are way too many of them… maybe they’re in some way trying to simplify their mess.

On the issue of Sex vs. Violence, id pick neither. I’d rather see dope visuals, and some kind of narrative, besides some chicks ass and tits for some deodorant? wtf.

It is weird. im not really sure what will be next.

I’m working on a spot right now for PBS, its a BLOOD ORGY commercial, to try and sell color pencils and crayons. It’s getting pretty fun. j/k.

Sir Monkey

deathtoprint, of course I’d rather see dope visuals with a great narrative over sex and violence. What I’m saying, it’s just known that these ad agencies will use the easy gimics sometimes, such as sex and/or violence to sell to the mass. And it’s also known that Europe uses more sex to sell and US uses more violence.

That’s all I’m stating and it goes back to Microsoft choosing to use the “go to sells tactic”, violence.

KGB

I wouldn’t categorize this spot as violent. Sure, there is fire in it, but its symbolic, and is not intended to be viewed in violent light.

And of all things, the US media is very sensored compared to Europe in general.

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