Zune Marketplace: yuck

Today, I fulfilled my dutiful obligatio as an open-minded journalist (ha!)/hard-core masochist and purchased a Microsoft Zune to replace my SanDisk Sa a as my music su cription device of choice. (I am a fan of the su cription model, in case you're wondering.) The Zune device itself is truthfully pretty slick: the interface is re o ive and intuitive, not to mention purdy. It's a little bulky, granted, but the outer-casing is smooth and it feels comfortable and "right" in the hand. The controls are a bit slo y -- plasticky and noisy -- but they work as expected.

My real gripe here, that kinda rui the deal for me and I'm sure for a lot of you, is the craptacular suckine of the Zune Marketplace. First, as Engadget adequately reported: i tall is a pain. I had no errors, but just the amount of work involved was exhausting. Then I bought a Marketplace su cription, and lo-and-behold: some of my -- nay, most of my -- favorite bands are nowhere to be seen. And other albums I've searched for (ie, Radiohead) require that you purchase them, even if you have a su cription. (And the album price i 't even in dollars -- it's in Microsoft's convoluted points scheme.) Some albums -- ie, This Providence -- offer most of the songs for download, but the most popular (in this case, "The Road to Jericho...") you're only able to get if you actually buy the whole album. That leaves me asking: With all of these limitatio , what the hell is the point of actually buying a su cription?

So not only have I graciously donated a buck to Universal for simply buying a Zune, they've decided to screw me over by sabotaging the $15/month su cription they're dreadfully eager to impose on customers.

I was cheering Microsoft on here: As I mentioned, I'm a fan of su cription services, and the Zune device i 't so bad. I wanted to see some decent competition, and I want to see A le add a su cription option to iTunes. But they totally screwed this one up, and no amount of prettine will save them. Microsoft, fix your Marketplace and your su cription details, then we'll talk. Until then -- stay away. Stay far, far away.

(Stay tuned for my Zune vs. iTunes comparison. Post any questio you'd like me to cover in the comments below.)