Looks like a huge trick just to get some consumers, not surprised.

That's like the worse deal you can ask for. 99 is ok, but 15$/Month for 2 years?

460 bucks for a 4GB Xbox with Kinect. Even with the conveniency paying gradually over time (at least to some people) , I don't see how anyone could spin this into making me see it as a good deal. 

These deals will be fantastic if they have similar deals for the 720. It could really push a lot of sales for a brand new console especially if the sales prospects for new consoles in the future look a little bleak.

You're right.  If they sell the 720 (man, I hate calling it that) for, let's say, $450 and they have a plan for $150 but XBK costs $15-$20 a month, a lot of people would pounce on the idea.  I think that may be the way things are going, anyway.  The hardware is getting more and more expensive but it's getting harder and harder to cram better visuals and impressive features into them.  We already have music, movies, video chat, internet, etc. in our consoles.  They're going to have to trick people into upgrading.   A low entry price combined with a steady, though inflated stream of money may just be the way to go.  Of course, keep the option for those that want to pay up front.

Depends on your credit and whether you were going to finance it.  What it really boils down to is $420 (cost of 4 gig 360 + kinect and 2 years of live) financed for 2 years to a total of $460, which works out to an APR of about 9%.  Not the greatest, but for the income bracket this deal targets it seems reasonable.

Then again, if you were really that poor it's better to not buy any system at all.

Oh, it's definitely flawed.  It's just that there are those who say that the 360 will lose support once a successor is released because the original Xbox lost support as soon as the 360 was released.  It looks like Microsoft will stand by the 360 for at least two more years.  I'm a believer in patterns/histories repeating themselves but, after only one previous generation, there isn't really much of a pattern to look for, yet.

It's a buisness trick. It's like the 1$ phones some companies sell.

If it doesn't sell, Microsoft won't support it anymore. It's really as simple as that. Could happen next year, could happen in 2016, who knows. But if it really is important to you how long a system is supported, then you should definitely go with a Playstation. There has never been any system from Sony that didn't get support for less than 10 years. For all others, your 360 won't stop working just because it isn't supported anymore. You can still have fun with it, my SNES is proof of that.

I don't really see the point. Such a deal is in no way a guarantee for ongoing support. They're just trying to get the 360 into families who can't really afford it. That's all. There is no guarantee that the consoles will be getting new games for at least two years.

Ouch.

Yeah, the first Xbox wasn't indicative of how Microsoft does business. 

Microsoft has a chart on their site of how they support products.  Generally, they support Version A for a period of years after Version B is released.  I'm guessing you already know the reasons why Microsoft ceased support of the Xbox a year after the Xbox 360 was released, but for those who don't it was because the agreement between NVidia and Microsoft ended and they weren't going to be getting any new GPUs.  It's hard to continue selling a product when you don't have GPUs. 

I suspect Microsoft would have continued selling the original Xbox had there been the opportunity.