Whatever Happened To The Prism DuroSport?

Last April we reviewed the Prism DuroSport 6000 digital audio player. At the time we determined it was the worst digital media player ever produced. After spending some time with Microsoft’s Zune, I’m prepared to declare that the Prism DuroSport has retained it’s title — although that may not be the case for much longer since the company is apparently working on something it’s calling the Pütz. Pütz will apparently be a “fully integrated approach to music and entertainment.” Having seen this company’s other products that sort of talk scares us.

The DuroSport company actually threatened to sue us after our scathing review. Later, they blamed our review for their poor sales. It’s more likely that the company’s almost non-existent distribution channel, and the products enormous size and convoluted DRM system had more to do with the poor sales.

Eventually we stopped getting threatening letters from DuroSport’s lawyers as the company turned its attention to other problems that weren’t so easily blamed on Medialoper. Like the t-shirt recall which the company blamed on the canine assistants used in the Moldovan apparel industry.

Then there was the Scarlett Johansson debacle. A company insider announced on his blog that DuroSport had acquired the exclusive rights to pre-load Johansson’s upcoming album of Tom Waits songs onto the Pütz player (at least we think that’s what he announced, his english is so bad we’re not really clear on the details). Later, of course, the company was forced to retract the announcement, explaining that one of their employees had apparently been the victim of a MySpace hoax.

Still, the biggest setback for the company was the failure to release the Pütz before year-end. DuroSport announced the product several days before Microsoft announced the Zune. They later claimed that the Zune was thinly veiled rip-off of the Pütz and accused Microsoft of corporate espionage. Since the Pütz still has not been released there’s no way to objectively compare the two products. At this point all we have to go on is a biased comparison of the two that a DuroSport insider offered last month. While DuroSport claims the Pütz will be superior to the Zune in several key ways, they also admit that they’ll be quite similar in other ways. For example, both products can be setup in a little under six hours.

Through it all the DuroSport company somehow still has a few fans. Only time will tell whether or not the die-hard DuroSport lovers will make the Pütz a success.