Xbox Live Gold is not good value, and it is holding the 360 back

[zeewap]

I disagree with this post. Here are some pertinent numbers for you:

~33m+ 360's have been shipped.

According to leaked Microsoft documents long ago, the Live Gold subscribe rate at that time was 50-60%. (Cant recall if this was USA only).

So, conservatively, ~15m people are paying $50 per year for Live Gold.

$50X15m=$750m of revenue per year MS takes in from Gold. Or 187.5m per quarter.

More pertinent numbers, the quarter ended September 30, the MS division Xbox is in posted $300m profit, the Sony division PS3 is in posted $600m loss.

So, Live is close to 200m per quarter in revenue. In other words 1/3 of Sony's PS3 losses could have been erased this last quarter if they had comparable Live Gold revenue. Similarly 2/3 of Microsofts profits would have disappeared without it.

This is why Sony is going to introduce a subscription service to PSN.