Today/Tomorrow Microsoft releases its much hyped hoped iPod killer, Zune. First off let me say that I welcome the Zune because I welcome open and free competition. It makes products better. It keeps companies on their toes. However, I have no expectations that the Zune player will help push portable music into a new era. It seems rushed and for every good thing (wireless sharing) there are a half dozen out-right failures (the strings attached to wireless sharing) in creating something truly remarkable. Take this review from the New York Times. It is all over the map.

As it turns out, the player is excellent. It can’t touch the iPod’s looks or coolness, but it’s certainly more practical. It’s coated in slightly rubberized plastic, available in white, black or brown — yes, brown. It won’t turn heads, but it won’t get fingerprinty and scratched, either. It sounds just as good as the iPod.

The Zune looks cooler than the iPod but it won’t turn heads? Strike One

The Zune matches the price ($250) and capacity of the 30-gigabyte iPod. But it’s noticeably thicker (0.6 inch vs. 0.4), taller (4.4 inches vs. 4.1) and heavier (5.6 ounces vs. 4.8). Battery life is the same for music playback (14 hours), slightly better for video (4 hours vs. 3.5).

It has the same battery life, storage capacity, and it costs the exact same price as an iPod but it is larger, heavier, and more cumbersome? Strike Two.

The Zune 1.0 player is pretty barren, too. It doesn’t have a single standard iPod amenity: no games, alarm clock, stopwatch, world clock, password-protected volume limiter, equalizer, calendar, address book or notes module.

Ball 1.

Incredibly, you can’t even use the Zune as an external hard drive, as you can with just about every other player on earth — an extremely handy option for carting around big computer files.

Foul Ball.

The big, whomping Zune news, though, is wireless sharing. The Zune has a built-in Wi-Fi antenna. (Turning it on costs you one hour of battery life.) During the playback of any photo or song, you can view a list of Zunes within 30 feet. Sending a song takes about 15 seconds, a photo 2 seconds; you can’t send videos at all. Your lucky recipient can accept or decline your offering — and, if you have really terrible taste, can block your Zune permanently.

It all works well enough, but it’s just so weird that Zunes can connect only to each other. Who’d build a Wi-Fi device that can’t connect to a wireless network — to sync with your PC, for example? Nor to an Internet hot spot, to download music directly?

Microsoft also faces what’s known as the Dilemma of the First Guy With a Telephone: Who you gonna call? The Zune will have to rack up some truly amazing sales before it’s easy to find sharing partners.

(Skip down one paragraph) The bigger problem, though, is the draconian copy protection on beamed music (though not photos). You can play a transmitted song only three times, all within three days. After that, it expires. You’re left with only a text tag that shows up on your PC so that — how convenient! — you can buy the song from Microsoft’s store.

This copy protection is as strict as a 19th-century schoolmarm. Just playing half the song (or one minute, whichever comes first) counts as one “play.” You can never resend a song to the same friend. A beamed song can’t be passed along to a third person, either.

What’s really nuts is that the restrictions even stomp on your own musical creations. Microsoft’s literature suggests that if you have a struggling rock band, you could “put your demo recordings on your Zune” and “when you’re out in public, you can send the songs to your friends.” What it doesn’t say: “And then three days later, just when buzz about your band is beginning to build, your songs disappear from everyone’s Zunes, making you look like an idiot.”

Microsoft says that the wireless sharing is a new way to discover music. But you can’t shake the feeling that it’s all just a big plug for Microsoft’s music store. If it’s truly about the joy of music discovery, why doesn’t Microsoft let you buy your discoveries from any of the PlaysForSure stores?

Strike 3.

I know what you’re thinking, “Micheal, we all know that you’ve taken the iPod kool-aid! iTunes has copyright restrictions, the iPod battery life stinks, it has had its day in the sun. You’re just blinded to new things that aren’t Apple products.”

No, I’m not blinded by my love for my iPod. The Zune does have a couple of neat bells and wistles that I would like to see on the next iPod.

Things like customization of the menus. On the Zune you can use any photo as the wallpaper making a truly unique device that can show off your distinctive personality.

Sorry to say, but I am underwhelmed by the Zune. Grossly underwhelmed. I was hoping for something great. Instead we were given something that reeks of corporate think-tankery- A product that latches onto the market to make a quick buck instead of driving the market forward to bigger and better things.

I wish the Zune the best but history’s landfills are filled with thousands products that promised big but delivered too little. The iPod has dominated our commerce, our vocabulary, and even our cultural identities. When I’m at the gym inevitably someone with an iPod will see me using mine and will give me a nod. Silently we know that we are part of something: brothers and sisters in the world of music appreciation. Will Zune users experience that same sense of camaraderie? That same sence of knowing? We shall see.

The consumers begin to vote with their wallets this week and by Christmas we should have a better idea of how long the Zune will last.

Yes, Welcome to the Social.