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MS at Gnomedex: I Don't Want to Wait for Longhorn to see you "get" something

It's interesting to read all the feeds from Gnomedex - I'm excited by a lot of what was announced so far but I'm looking forward to see what Audible really announces and here's why:

1. RSS in Longhorn. Yeah, that's really great except one thing: MS has a bad track record of getting all the upgrades to happen (realistically, it really happens when people replace their machines). So while I'm excited by what's coming with IE 7 , I don't like waiting for stuff.

2. Podcasting. I know Curry is doing some announcements about Podcasting and the like but I was REALLY surprised that Microsoft hasn't done something about it in a BIG way yet. (maybe they will announce later today so I'll update if need be)

Windows Media Player isn't as big as iTunes but it likely is on just as many desktops and it has built in support for online music providers such as Napster, MSN Music, MusicNow and Audible, among others. These are , for the most part, web-based providers. Why hasn't the MSN team said "hmm --- why not simply start offering MSN Podcasts by pulling in the iPodder OPML and offering it right from within WMP?"

There's a lot to be said about taking the time to get it done right. WMP could do with a better synchronizing with the Pocket PC (why Sync and Go only supports WMA files is beyond me) and of course, there is that entire "WMA vs. MP3" philosophical discussion but if the goal is 100,000,000 listeners (as Adam mentioned on his Gnomedex show), why NOT take the existing directory, revise it with a Style Sheet and make it instantly available via MSN Music or a new MSN Podcasts option?

It's OPML -> it can be done - so while I'm excited by all this "did you ever think we would get this far so fast?" discussion, I'm not bowled over with enthusiasm with the "hurry up and wait" approach of Longhorn when they have the power to change the way people listen to shows and they can do it without the 60-90 days it takes to build new software.

Robert Scoble, you're a fan of podcasting - hasn't this bug been planted yet with the other teams at MS? I don't want to have to wait.

Hmmm....maybe Audible will have something but then again, I just went to their site and it says "Audible is experiencing a temporary outage". Maybe Gnomedex really is eating everyone's bandwidth.

I'll be patient - the show ends today and I'm sure there are more announcements. If not, maybe I'll switch to iTunes.

The Audible comment from Paul is interesting.

We will see.

PubSub: Gnomedex,

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