Zune-Zune

In the wee hours of the morning, an easter egg from Microsoft reared its ugly head, and every 30GB Zune on the planet (probably) stopped working. The culprit? A date driver that can’t handle leap years. See, this is the first time the 30GB Zune has had to face the spectre of a leap year — it’s a device from the pre-leap year dark ages of 2006.

The fora have been waaaaay active, with Zune v. iPod jihadists going about their typical sniping, with Microsoft being very, very, very quiet on a solution to the issue until about 45mins ago when they said they’d identified the problem, and that it would resolve itself at midnight GMT tonight — sorta like a New Year’s present from the dudes at Redmond. They’ve even committed to a firmware update prior to the next leap year… in 2012. I assume it won’t take them quite that long.

I’m enjoying poking fun at this just as much as anyone else, but it could’ve been anyone’s devices suffering this fate, and I would be just as amused. Like several folks noted today, thank heaven it wasn’t something in aircraft or satellites or something far more insidious that was affected by this little glitch of testing. It is entertaining though to watch from the sidelines as folks go through Hannah Montana withdrawals all over the net, threatening lawsuits, allegiance changes, sailing their Zunes into the streets on high arc trajectories… At the end of the day, it is just music, but I certainly get the point of the rabid fans who want their tunes. I even saw one poster bemoaning the fact that he would have to go home tonight listening to CDs. Imagine the humiliation!

I guess this will become a cautionary tale of things are tested, and why you don’t just test the happy paths — you test all the paths. Today… The Day The Zunes Stood Still. Y2K9. Insert your own pun here. 🙂