Zune Thoughts: Ladies and Gentlemen: The Worst Zune Review Ever

"It's bigger, boxier and less shiny than the iPod. In my book, that's a bad thing, as is the bizarre brown color and even more bizarre semi-translucent green tones at the corners...this thing doesn't seem to be compatible with my iMac. The included software won't run at all, and I'm now investigating a runaround to actually get files on and off the player...until we can try out the Wi-Fi functions and the Zune Marketplace, it's not completely fair to deliver a verdict…but we will anyway."

This "review" from Popular Mechanics’ Upgrade editor Erik Sofge seems to be a the result of two things coming crashing together: disastrously bad media relations and someone who should have never graduated journalism school (or maybe he never went). First off, who sent him a brown Zune? Brown is a colour that people either love or hate, and while I completely understand why Microsoft is offering the Zune in brown (it's a trendy colour again, though most fashion-challenged geek bloggers don't grasp that), the PR company sending out Zunes to the media should only send the white or the black. Period. Next, the PR company obviously didn't ask if the person reviewing the device even owned a Windows XP-based computer! Sofge's own blunt-as-a-butter knife journalistic instincts come into play here, because one thing you should check on before starting to write an article is if it's meant to work with your niche platform. In the same way that it would be unfair for me to slam iLife in a review because it wouldn't work on my Windows XP PC, it's utterly ridiculous that Sofge is reviewing a product he can't actually use. And then, rather than fessing up to his lack of knowledge in accepting a product for review that he can't fully use, he delivers a verdict anyway. I can only assume that he gets paid by the word and his editors are out at a strip club somewhere rather than checking his work.