Microsoft to increase price of Xbox Live Gold

[Reasonable]

NJ5 said:

Alby_da_Wolf said:

HTML and Kerberos werent' enough? They just HAD to make also a proprietary version of the definition of free?   

Yes, amazingly both Nintendo and Sony (neither of which makes a browser for anything else) have a browser for their consoles, but Microsoft which makes their own browser couldn't provide one for the 360, instead opting for stupid custom interfaces to some websites...

For better or worse MS strategy for Live is clearly to create a closed community with all access points controlled by MS.  You pay them a fee that is presented as covering online gaming, but in fact that fee is also required to be at all active in the community and to get all the extended access Facebook, etc.  Essentially for MS if you want any real online capability via their console you pay for it.

I don't particularly like it - one reason I don't have a 360 - but you've got to admire the beauty of it from a commercial point of view.

If there are 20 million Gold Live accounts then MS has a community of that size willing to pay it to arrange access to online gaming plus the broader aspects of internet social networks, as an additional surcharge and controlling layer between themselves and the content - for example you need to pay MS for Live then Netflix or Hula, or you use MS matchmaking servers and chat services.

Pretty amazing and TBH I'd do it myself if I could.  As a consumer I'll vote against it - I want a more Google, ad and advertising but free to the gamer, driven environment.

I'm dissapointed Sony went with PSN instead of considering a strong alliance with Google for online access driven using Google's method of generating revenue and keep it 100% free, but hey, I don't call those shots!