Randy Boswell
Sun
The Microsoft Zune media player is slated to be released by Christmas this year. Photograph by : The Associated Press
Microsoft Corp. market researchers in Quebec found themselves in a potential linguistic pickle when they conducted consumer test-runs of the digital music player Zune, which the company says will be out by Christmas competing with the iPod.
A Microsoft spokeswoman in Montreal told CanWest News Service that “it was pointed out to us” during focus groups in the province that the proposed brand name sounded much like a French-Canadian term used as a euphemism for penis or vagina.
The French word “zoune” and the variant “bizoune” typically serve as a less jolting way of referring to male or female genitalia when addressing children.
“It’s very much slang,” said Nathalie Bergeron, noting that the words are not common parts of French-Canadian vocabulary.
“Microsoft did do extensive customer research in Quebec,” Bergeron added, and concluded that the name Zune was “very effective” and posed no risk of becoming known as an embarrassing double entendre.
“It’s quite a stretch,” she said.
But sounds of snickering over the apparent Zune branding predicament have been emanating for months from technology-obsessed corners of the Internet.
In July, during an earlier round of publicity about Microsoft’s plans to introduce Zune, the British-based business news site theinquirer.net revealed the potential “naming conundrum” in Quebec under the headline: “My Zune is bigger than yours.”
A Quebec resident posting to the website crazyapplerumors.com argued that “zoune” was so inoffensive it translated as “wee-wee.”
But he added: “All of Quebec has been giggling for the last couple of days at the thought of Mr. Gates swearing that there was an 80-per-cent chance that he’d whip out his little zoune before the holiday season . . .”
© The Vancouver Province 2006