Looks like the Great Zune Massacre of 2008 was a day 366 issue.  Again, someone forgot to throw out the code from the lowest ten percent of the Stack-Rank system.  Sorry to sound harsh, but this is type of thing will flunk you out of Programming 101.  I don't even want to get started on the QA failure, but it is even worse.

Semi-Kudos to the Zune Team.  There was a notice on the support page shortly after the original post acknowledging the problem and indicating they were working on it.  Microsoft also got word out through its MSNBC subsidiary as a news item, linked to the support page.  I still say the warning should have been more prominent and on the main page, not the support page, but that is relatively minor.

My Zune is recharging and should be OK.