Ok, by now you've seen the Ignition press release, and read the Billboard article. I thought I'd provide a bit more thoughts. Ignition is unique in that consumers get access to great new music from cool artists, via multiple touch points (Zune, MSN, and Xbox). Each month folks will get access to some exclusive content.
Scott Goldberg, writing in DMWmedia asks "But is Microsoft a music aficionado?" While I think he was being rhetorical, it's a fair question. We've brought together a pretty impressive team of music editors and writers - I posted on the ZMP team a few weeks ago. I would definitely call the team music aficionados. In other commentary, Crunchgear said "Score one for Microsoft," which actually made me check for (other) signs of Hades freezing over.
We're continually looking for ways to help develop artists, and I think Ignition is a good step in that direction. It's a win for everybody - consumers get access to cool content, across a variety of platforms, and the artists get access to approx. 30 million consumers. And each month, we'll do it again - this month it's Maximo Park, and we'll announce next month's artist next month.
As a bonus, here's some Maximo Park wallpaper (courtesy of Zune.net)
