Microsoft’s Zune aims to be social butterfly | CNET News.com

Microsoft’s Zune aims to be social butterfly | CNET News.com

CNET (and the rest of the web), is filled with details about Microsofts Zune soon to be released portable digital media player.

The information has been made available due to a FCC filing.

Some of the details are interesting. Here’s a quote from the CNET article.

Zune owners can act as their own DJ, sending streaming music content to up to four other devices, according to documents filed with the Federal Communications Commission . With the device’s wireless networking abilities turned on, people can send and receive photos, as well as “promotional copies of songs, albums and playlists,” according to the filing, made public Thursday.

I think this is a killer feature, and it sounds exactly like some of the ideas I’ve had previously.

But will people actually use it? Bluetooth hasn’t emerged as a social technology, in my experience very few people actually enable Bluetooth except for use with wireless headsets.

I envision that I can surf the local wireless “radios”, listening in to what people in the near proximity is listening to, without their knowledge.

Unfortunately I think that Zune will come with major security features, making it impossible to surf the airwaves freely.

I hope that the specifications for this wireless technology will be open, so that it can find it’s way into other consumer products, I’d love to be able to hook my player up to a stereo without the need for cables.

I actually expected Apple to be first to market with something like this, but when they join in, I definitely expect that they will come up with a solution, that is easier to use than anything Microsoft can come up with. Something that is as simple to use as shared music in iTunes is what I want, actually that’s exactly what I want!