Live should be free. To play online should be free. Gaming is not suppose to be an expensive hobby. (IMO)

Not sure why you're in this thread, since you have no answer to the question.  And I get it that you're into single player games more than playing with friends... but umm, if you're all about saving money, then why did you bother buying a Wii and PS3 to begin with as you just stated you never use them.  Seems like a bigger waste of money to me to own those, am I not right?  Since you invested so much money into your PC and all...  which by the way, is pretty similar to my PC, so I know how good it is.  There are so many things to save your money on... not going to see any movies in the theater with friends, just download it on your PC or buy it on DVD after it's come out and cheap.  Not go out to dinner and spend a good amount for good food... when you can just heat up a TV dinner or make a sandwich.   Do you do all of these things?  Are you Mr. Fiscal Responsibility and you never spend money on anything?  Clearly not, as you just admitted you have several hundred dollars of consoles collecting dust at the moment. 

We all get it, you don't care for Xbox Live (then no reason to even post in this thread then) but to say it's a waste of money for everyone is just not very smart.  I paid $80 for 24 months.  That is $3.33 a month... or around a dime a day.  I gather more loose change a day than that.  I might lose more change in my car a day than what I pay for Xbox Live.  And what I get out of it is great entertainment with friends.  Maybe you don't have many friends, but I do, and when 4 of us are hanging out, we can all have a good time.  Can't do that with PC.  I wish PC gaming was more popular, but it's not.  It just isn't.  And I would rather play Mass Effect on a 50 inch plasma and FEEL it than just being on my 23 inch monitor.   Put it this way, if you ever go out to a nice restaurant, (maybe you don't, who knows), but if you did, you can spend up to $70 with tip for 2 meals.  Or you could stay home and make a couple sandwiches or a microwave meals.  You'd save at least $60, maybe more when you count gas.  And for less than that ONE dinner, Xbox Live customers get all the things they enjoy for an entire year.  It just isn't a lot of money to spend for a quality multiplayer experience.   But like you said, you're not big into playing with others. 

Side note, one simple reason, OS or layout aside, that makes Xbox Live superior to PSN, is that they give you a free mic when you get any console.  Communication is key in success, and that is one of the biggest differences.  PS3's should all come with mic's IMO.  This is the age of communication and interacting with people from all over the world... and it's much better and easier to do it talking than typing.

Lots of things in life should be free.  But they aren't.  Especially when it's good enough that people will pay for it.  To call a dime a day expensive though... the economy in your area must be rough. 

I have played on Steam, battle.net, PSN, XBL and SegaNet.

Okay let's da a short comparison:

Steam is a good online store, but that is it. Try to play CounterStrike on Steam for more than 45 minutes without having at least 3 people cheating. The social aspect is limited and of course being on PC means you have to use different software. On a public server the chat options are terrible and so is the quality. And most games don't even support it. So most of the talking is done via another software like TS2, Ventrilo or even Skype. So you need to talk which TS2 / Vent IP you have to use. This alone kills the fun. You actually have to prepare your spontaneous gaming session if you want to caht. And whenever another player beats you (no matter if public or private) you still don't know if the other player plays fair. Of course the interface is not userfriendly at all.

Battle.net is a more basic version. I still play Warcraft 3, because the game is just fantastic. The average search time can be up to 5 minutes, but that is fine for a game this old. The problem is more or less the same: Cheaters. MH seems to be pre installed on Russian PCs. It is a mess. The problem with the chatting is still there. Vent / TS2 / Skype.

PSN is not user friendly. Yes, all of us are nerds, because we spend our time in gaming forums. The majority of gamers is different. The Apps are not well integrated and the social aspect is missing. Game chat can be used, but not everyone has a headset (same problem on PC btw). The bad part is that cross game chat is not available. The worse part is that the cross game chat won't be available due to lack of RAM. Futureproof hardware, heh? Not having cross game chat is simply not an option in 2011. The PSN games don't have a demo, there are not a lot of Apps. Yes there is a browser, but whoever considers that a great solution should be permabanned. My smartphone has a far better browser. Don't get me started with the PSN hack, updates, downtimes etc. PSN is behind XBL in every segment. It is free, have fun with it, but it is not as good as XBL.

XBL is by far the best service I ever played on. The chat options are perfect. There are hackers (there always will be) but those are limited. The way the Apps and the interface are built is just awesome. It always feels like one source, even though MS did not develop these Apps. The advertisement some people mention is just not a big deal. People like to dramatise this. The way Kinect works is brilliant so everybody wants to use and try it. All the Arcade games come with demos. Beacons are awesome as well and really push the social aspect. Additionally the customer service is very good as well. I had one issue with one movie a couple of years ago and it was handled very well. I received my money back in a couple of minutes. It really feels like a overall good service and a great experience.

There is as much anti ps3 BS as anti xbox 360 BS... Deal with it...

Live on the first Xbox was $50 and the service was the best available on consoles. I don't game on a PC. Didn't have an origianl Xbox.

When I got a 360, Live was $50. I thought it was an awesome service. It cost $50. I thought it was worth it. PS3's online is good and just as functional but I got my PS3 in 2008, it was nowhere near XBL's level. Sony offered it for free as a selling point, I assume. PSN's quality has increased by leaps and bounds over the past few years. It's still not as good as Live but it's pretty good.

PSN can't increase in cost because it would cause backlash amongst users. I think it's worth about $40 a year, personally. It's not that Xbox Live should be free- I think it's worth every penny. It's that Sony has never tried to make money on the PSN (aside from the PSN+ program). Sony's giving away a source of revenue for free like idiots. Microsoft is running a business and making money off of it.

Live is worth it because people will pay for it. Just like how a diamond is worth nothing more than what people are willing to pay for it. If you were starving and you had a diamond, that diamond would be worth the price of a ham sandwich. I think Live is worth $60 a year so I pay for it. If I didn't, I wouldn't. I can't explain to you why you should think something is worth what I think. If the free option is better for you, go for it. I tried the free option and I went back to the paid option.

Hey i chose not to use LIVE, I'm like the OP, is $60 a year good enough to play online?

edit: It is my firm belief that MS makes enough to support LIVE with the use of ads.

Live offers nothing over PSN online except cross-game/party chat in terms of exclusive differences - although for many it's a big different and I'd agree if you play online a lot with the same group of friends it makes Live a fair bit better.

Outside that I'd need you to list differences because as a dual owner (360 and PS3) I don't see any.  Most of the recent 360 updates are catching Live overall offering up to PSN not moving it ahead in terms of TV, etc.

I mention PC simply because you mention cost.  If you're going to buy the best that remains a PC.  You get everything plus more consoles offer with better media support and more open connectability.  I was just teasing in that I know and saw you put "consoles"... but let a guy tease without overly being serious about it.

I choose not to pay $60 dollars a year either. Its not unusual to see a discount on the web or at stores. Recently I paid $40 for a bundle package that included a year Gold subscription, head set, and keypad.

An infrastructure like Xbox Live can't be supported on ads a lone. Perhaps if they ran commercials before an online game began, but that would be a nuisance people would pay not to have.

Last I heard PSN was still running in the red, not sure if PSN Plus changed that. Either way, on the PS3 publishers on have operate their own servers which cost a lot of money (Demon's Souls was on the verge of having its servers shut down). On top of that Sony forces publishers to pay bandwidth fees to put stuff on the PSN Store. Which is why there is much less free content on PSN.

To the contrary, Xbox Live operates all the servers (except for EA). They also cover all the bandwidth fees for publishers which leads to more content on Live. Ultimately, we're paying for a service that cuts cost for publishers, offers more content, and allows Xbox 360 to actually thrive financially. Its really the opposite of PS3 and PSN.

If you pay $60 a year, that's only $5 a month. I paid $40 so its more like $3 a month for me. Xbox Live is my cheapest and most enjoyable entertainment expense.

True, but we often pay or pay more for preference.

For example, I like to play Halo and Gears. Should I settle with Killzone or Resistance because I can play online free? No, I'd rather pay the few bucks to play what I enjoy.

I could get a burger at McDonalds for a dollar. But more often I go Fuddruckers and pay $10. Why? Preference!