To Be Fair, Sales Figures Were Limited to Consumers Willing to Admit Owning a Zune

May 9, 2008 at 6:38 pm PT

Was he inebriated? Do you even know anyone who owns a Zune?”

–-Apple CEO Steve Jobs on Microsoft’s claim that the Zune is now a worthy alternative to the iPod.

Despite its feature differentiations and, er, “distinctive” color palette, Microsoft’s (MSFT) Zune has yet to prove itself the iPod killer it was once touted as. Since its launch in November of 2006, the Zune has sold 2 million units. In comparison, Apple (AAPL) in its last quarter sold 10.6 million iPods–quintuple Microsoft’s cumulative sales to date. Zune’s market share in this space during the first quarter: 4%. Apple’s share: 71%.

Clearly, the only thing being killed by Microsoft’s iPod killer are Microsoft’s chances for unseating Apple in a market that would seem–according to relatively flat year-over-year iPod sales–to have peaked without it.

Tagged with: Apple, color, iPod, iTunes, John Paczkowski, market share, Microsoft, quarter, sales, Steve Jobs, Zune

comments so far. Add yours.

http://allthingsd.com/ Dave Barnes

Why is Lex Luthor standing next to Bill Gates?
Oh, I know, the color is “Kryptonite Green”.
http://blog.macb.net Mac Beach

The color scheme alone makes me wonder why a company would sabotage their own products.
David Owens

ZUNE and Vista are synonymous with failure. Only the uh, dipsticks in the press would call something so lame a “killer”.
Bernardine Wood-Smothers

oooo! Is there a Gold Shag Carpet model as well?
http://allthingsd.com/ Eric Welch

I handled a Zune once. The BestBuy employee tried to tell me how it’s so much better than an iPod. I was on my third iPod at the time.

I had to restrain myself from laughing in his face after feeling the cheapness of the Zune, and knowing that Microsoft has already abandoned one group of music buyers who trusted their music would “play for sure.”
John Mullinax

I got the brown one as a gift (one of the original brick shaped ones). I like brown, and I actually found that I enjoyed having something different than everyone else.

Definitely not a fan of the green. :-) Will probably move up to the blue one at some point.

But following links on a related post I found the Microsoft news release — and coolness — it sounds like MSFT will deliver the best features as a software update so I only have to buy a new one to get extra storage/different color. Awesome!