It may come as a surprise to our American cousins, but the Zune isn?t available in Europe yet. Originally scheduled for a 2008(!) release, rumours are now floating around that it could be launched for Christmas 2007.

Reindorp said Microsoft was not yet ready to officially announce when it would launch the service in Europe but it could possibly be out before the end of the year.

"The industry moves in this sort of Christmas to Christmas cycle. So you can expect that there will be more devices, more features in the market at that point," he said.

"Our next round of introductions will probably be in time for the holiday of this year."

As you can imagine news of this has been met by waves of indifference by the entire continent, who can?t see what all the fuss was about? Probably because there isn?t an MP3 player shortage over here, and apart from a Microsoft logo, the Zune really doesn?t do anything new.

Still, at least we get to get it.

Source: Reuters

Zune reaches No. 2 in its debut week

Todd Bishop wrote an article in the Seattle Post Intelligencer reporting that Microsoft Corp.?s Zune music player claimed a No. 2 spot among portable media devices in its first week on the U.S. retail market.

I?m impressed and my guess is that Apple has some concern. A new item, loaded with features that has people talking, looking, analyzing and ultimately buying.

There is no question that the distance between #1 and #2 is BIG but to jump in at that spot is pretty impressive. Yes, the media hype clearly helped that initial grasp of this spot so Microsoft still has a long way to go to firm it up ? only time will tell how it all ends up.

Market research firm NPD Group said sales of the Microsoft player edged out devices from previous second-place holder SanDisk Corp. in the week ended Nov. 18. But Zune was a distant second to Apple Computer Inc.?s iPod, and its second-place showing came amid widespread media attention and launch hype.

Zune reaches No. 2 in its debut week