Super-excited by the new Zune

Imagine a dream coming true...

It looks as if Microsoft's got it right at last. Let's look at how the new Zunes leapfrog Apple and set a new direction -- and a new benchmark -- for personal social connectivity

We all thought the wi-fi on Zune 1 was a good idea, but woefully implemented. Little did we know: now, it's a link to the world of Web 2.0. The deals Microsoft has cut with hotspot companies mean that for your $10 subscription, whenever you're within reach of a hotspot, you're connected. It's as easy as turning on a mobile phone. (3G? WiMax? The rumour is that Zune 3 will be even smarter at sniffing out connectivity wherever it goes: if Zune 2 is the success it deserves to be, expect the operators to come to Microsoft. And that Zune phone idea -- ah, you're there already).

So you're connected. So what? That means you're in the Zone, Microsoft's secret weapon, a collection of Web services that makes everything Google's done on the social front seem a bit, well... clunky.

Sure, it looks a bit like - and is as easy to use as - iTunes, and you can buy music, videos and ebooks through it, but it's two way. Take a video with that camera on the back of the Zune 2 (it's only 1 megapixel, but that's plenty), and it's in your personal Zone in seconds; online for everyone. Same for audio. Want an automatic link to feed what you do to YouTube, MySpace, Facebook? All part of the service -- a smart, open XML feed system that's like RSS but built for humans.

And get this: there's automatic rights management that makes sense. MS has plumbed in a Creative Commons rights engine (called, alas, the Zonage) that means you can just dial in how you want to publish what you do. All open, all above board, and it means MS is actually working for the users. Walk past a news story on the street? Your video is up for the world to see in seconds - and anyone who wants to use it commercially has a direct link to you, on your terms. You could publish a music video directly to a million people in the time it takes to push a few buttons - or set up a teaser that links to your new album, online for a dollar a pop.

Or you can just sit back and bathe in the hits: you're told exactly what's happening to your stuff online. Microsoft is the first company to really live the truth - that Web 2.0 is people, and people own what they make - and provide the tools to turn that into reality. Microsoft says that it's spent as much on the legal engineering as the technical, and that Zonage is watertight. It even knows about -- and encourages -- fair use.

The other really clever tech stuff - the online video editing and mashup - is limited at the moment, but you can title, cut and paste, mix in a bit of music, do a handful of crossfades and other effects, all through a really simple interface that Just Works. Microsoft Research really earned their oats on that one. Yes, it speaks to Zonage.

And it's all backed up with Zocial, Microsoft's rather twee name for a sort of super text-messaging/IM service that keeps you up to the minute on who's watching your videos, who's making stuff you want to know about, all while mediating your normal online interactions through the Zune. It's persistent, it knows about rich media, it integrates well with email and other IM clients, it's plumbed into the reporting side of Zonage; it really is everything you do at your laptop with other people, but in your pocket. Again, Microsoft has cracked it with the interface: like all truly great products, it works so simply you can't imagine why nobody did it that way in the first place.

It's also a superb pipe for advertising. Think about that, Google: Microsoft now owns the most important piece of screen acreage on the planet, the one in your pocket. Actually, that's not quite true: everything in the Zone, Zonage and Zocial underlines the fact that YOU own it, and you set the rules. Microsoft is telling advertisers that if they want a piece of it, they'll have to earn it by making stuff we want to know about - but of course, MS is there to help them.

So, welcome Zune 2 - the first portable device designed for Web 2.0 from the ground up, the first truly connected social device, the first real break from the rather clunky Web-in-your-pocket world of mobile phones of today, and the first real sign that Microsoft has the vision, energy and innovative fire to build the future -- not just ride on its coat-tails, trying to pin it to the ground with a nailgun. It makes the iPhone web interface, nice though it is, look like lipstick on a pig.

Oh, and it's a really neat music player.

And no, you can't get it in brown.

(And then I woke up.)