Of all the clueless participants in digital music's evolution, Sony "gets it" less than anybody. Apparently fevered by its dual role as a device designer and a big-five record label, the company has demonstrated a toxic case of self-importance. Again and again, Sony has attempted to persuade consumers that its proprietary storage formats are somehow superior and more desirable than standard formats. Sony seems to believe that we prefer limitations. The company also seems to think its brand is worth something when it comes to commodities such as memory and file formats.

Anyway, all this is leading up to today's launch of Connect, a new music-download service. "Seamless integration with Sony products" is the promise. Which, of course, means seamless exclusion from the products most people own. Sony is offering download files in the ATRAC3 format, which few people have heard of and almost nobody wants. Just what we need, right? Yet another file format to divide the market already schismed by Apple's AAC, Napster's WMA, Rhapsody's Redbook, and RealPlayer Store's RAX.

Sony is hoping to use the music files to sell portable devices which can play those files. And the Sony product most spotlighted by Connect? The musty, never-popular, proprietary nightmare called the Sony MiniDisc. Leave it to Sony to attempt a disc revival in a download store, and a proprietary disc format at that!

More on Connect service features this week and next.