I feel that MS is looking at becoming a 3rd party publisher/developer. They know that the X1 isn't doing well, so why not do something else that gets them more money in return?

Ok, What are they going to do after this? It sounds completely useless.

Obviously, they're headed towards something that they're not willing to share with us yet.
Hopefully, it's convenient and they nail whatever they're trying to do.

Well, no one outside of microsoft knows what they're up to. 

Living Room > Keyboard, mouse & desk.

3rd party publisher on all platforms will try to steal steam sales.  Will pull in users with exclusives like HAlo and Forza to their service.  

They have the $ to fund plenty game developments and seal devs to Ms publishing deals.  

Would be good for Nintendo if that's true, but I'll believe it when I see it. MS has so much money that there's no tremendous pressure on them to leave if they don't feel like it.

Well, its not a bad plan. I agree that it seems that a new Xbox is still a decision they havent made. They are going all out trying to turn around the One into a sucess and setting up an alternative plan in case of failure.

But as usual, they might be rushing into things. The infrastructure still isnt good enough to make it work.

I think so too. If I were in charge of MS, I would have gotten rid of the Xbox division years ago.

I think Microsoft are done with conventional consoles. And make a more all in one entertainment unit more so than the Xbone, but also focus on Steam like library.

Still will sell a little less than the Xbone I think.