We got a peek at the Billboard Mag piece on the Microsoft Zune player, which for all the buzz that's been going around, is fairly light on details. Microsoft says it's a "brand" (probably in the way that iPod is a brand), and that Zune-branded devices are going to follow this first flagship model—portable video players and game devices.

Microsoft is thinking about "'seven or eight' wireless scenarios" that they could possibly enable on the Microsoft Zune player, some of which are browsing other users' libraries, buying and downloading songs w/o a PC and viewing a "digital locker". Like reports said earlier, MS is focusing on collabrative and sharing with the Zune player, allowing users to "view each other's playlists" and "recommend music and sample tracks".

What's also fairly surprising is that they say music will be the first content offered by their online service, with video coming later. That probably means no equivalent of the iTunes TV shows or Music Videos until later. The music service isn't going to be related to MSN Music, which may wither and die with this Zune service taking its spotlight.

Here's how the Zune player fits into Microsoft's big picture alongside devices like the Xbox 360 and Windows Media smartphones:That scenario is to provide ubiquitous access to digital media from a wide range of Windows-powered devices in what ultimately aspires to be one part MySpace, one part iTunes and one part Xbox Live.

More news as we get it. – Jason Chen