Microsoft Unveils “Zune Originals” Store — Engraved Artwork for Your Zune

By Michael Santo
Executive Editor, RealTechNews

Launched yesterday, a day before the new Zune models, Microsoft’s “Zune Originals” store goes Apple one better — or two or three better. Apple will engrave a couple of lines of text on the back of your iPod. Microsoft will engrave up to five lines of text only. Or you can select from the “Tattoo Series 1″ (20 designs, 3 lines of text) or the “Artist Series” (27 designs). And right now, the additional charge is waived.

The store is here. You need Flash to use the site, though, and for some reason, the site didn’t like Internet Explorer 7. On the other hand, it was fine with Firefox. Knowing my laptop, it’s probably just my computer.

The artists include Colletivo Studios, Catalina Estrada, Laurent Fetis, Sam Flores, Klaus Haapaniemi, Pierre Marie, Kenzo Minami, Parskid, Mike Perry, Phunk Studios, Chisato Shinya, Skwak, Iosefatu Sua, Tado, Nobumasa Takahashi, Ramiro Torres, Darvin Vida and Steve Wilson.

And I even saw Hokusai’s Great Wave in “Tattoo Series 1.”

We Say: The positive: it’s really cool looking — and for now, free. The negative: you have to buy from Microsoft — meaning full retail price. And although it’s cool, it’s not going to make much of a difference in market share, now is it?