Sony finally sees the disconnect
For a company with a history of trying to push proprietary formats onto an unwilling public, this must have been a hard one to swallow, but Sony has decided to let ATRAC go the way of the eight-track. In conjunction with the release of two new Walkman players, the first of the U.S. models to support video, Sony said it was finally ditching its pet format and phasing out the Connect music service that supported it. Instead, the new Walkman models will ship with Windows Media Player 11 to manage digital libraries and will also play MP3 and AAC tracks. Whoever staged the intervention that finally got Sony to kick the junk did the company a service. With that ball and chain off its ankle, Sony is now free to join all the other companies who don’t make iPods in a race for second place.
To my mind, Blu-Ray is another Sony format that shouldn’t have seen the light of day. Sony is just too quick to come out with its own formats for everything. Beta, 8mm video, When will Sony ever learn to ask consumers what they want and stop trying to shove something off on them.
What Sony has still not learned is that mediocre technology good marketing always beats good technology with mediocre marketing. Sony has consistently made superior technology with the belief that people inevitably buy whatever is superior. The fact is only the technologically advanced consumer buys technology because of its quality. The rest of the world buys what it is told to buy.