First of all, if the Microsoft Surface Remix Project (further referred as MSRP) is unfamiliar to you, please visit the official info site of the project.
Promises indeed but nothing else, eh? MSRP was launched last September with images and promises. Little else exists even today.
The main problem with MSRP is that there is no hardware – mainly the cover needed to use it – available even if one actually owned the Surface 2 tablet. You cannot basically buy a MSRP kit anywhere: all kits have so far been given as prizes in different contests.
My educated guess is that there actually won’t be any MSRP kits available in near future, perhaps ever. Microsoft did not have the best of experience with the first Surface edition, and the same could be said about people having tried the second edition.
Added to this, the Windows 8.1 operation system – under which MSRP works – has been nothing short of a massive failure when both sales and user experience are in question.
Lately rumours about Microsoft moving forward in operation systems have grown stronger. The Windows 9 – presumably with the working title Threshold – should come out in a year or so, and during that period only a minor service update would be released for Windows 8.1.
Thus all the things presented on the MSRP site would basically remain in the level of presentation. It is no use launching products for an operation system already in terminal state.
As a member of Indaba Music I also noticed before Christmas that there were numerous contests linked to MSRP on. The promises sounded convincing: have your music released worldwide by a major sofware company etc. (I dared to publicly question the whole hype around MSRP and ended up getting a personal private rant via e-mail from Indaba CEO)
However it is likely that the hype realization won’t ever happen. The latest Indaba remix contest features an artist meant to be a part of MSRP official launch. Thus Microsoft is now releasing the music without the actual music service. That is indeed the silent version of Microsoft Surface Remix Project.
Missing Sample 