New Dashboard Commercials Bring Ad Breaks To Your 360

By Luke Plunkett (Edit, to draft, un-top, Slurp)

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As many of you have no doubt probably seen by now if you've been connected to Xbox Live, Microsoft's new dashboard advertisements have begun appearing for Xbox 360 owners.

Rather than the standard, static advertisements you're used to seeing, these bring running commercials to your 360, in some cases complete with video and, more annoyingly, sound. You can see an example of one running in this video here.

Josh Lovison, of digital media experts IPG, tells us that these new Silverlight ads won't as intrusive as you may have first feared, as they've been designed to "fit with the rest of the interface". So you won't be seeing pop-up ads, or replacement banners, or watermarks, or news tickers, or anything like that. You'll just be seeing ads running in the same NXE "windows" as you find everything else on the console's user interface.

Interestingly, Lovison also says that Microsoft's entire move to the New Xbox Experience may have been partly influenced by the desire/need for advertising, as the "windows" that all NXE content is displayed in, from videos to demos to Xbox Live Arcade titles, "just so happen to be IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) standard sizes". Meaning a Flash/Silverlight ad from a website can be dropped directly onto the 360 dashboard.

I haven't seen one of these myself yet; I'm presuming you can just navigate away from them, and aren't forced to watch them?

I saw this. Don't have to watch it and sound only plays when you are on it.  Looks neat even in 1080P on 67 inch TV. Why can't they stream game footage like this?

It will help Microsoft get more money for the gaming division for more games and projects.

That is one cute meerkat.

Anyone complaining about it 1)Has not used their 360 in months or 2) Does not own one. There have been ads like this for over a month for Torchwood Children of Earth and a few other movie/tv show items, and not one person has posted any complaints about it. It's not bothersome in the slightest. You do not need to watch them, you can just click right past them if you don't want to see it. 

I think it's pretty good.
You get to watch trailers without having to click anywhere and they aren't all that intrusive.


All I hope is that it doesn't get overblown and we see more ads for non gaming products than links for xbl content.

If anybody thinks it is going to stop there, they are mistaken. Remember when cable came out, and there were no commercials?

In germany there is a hangover ad.

Compare the meerkat dot com
Compare the market dot com
siimplessss

This is a non-issue. I have seen a handful of them on NXE--you can navigate right past them if you want, just like all the other ads. You are never forced to watch any ads on Xbox Live. If you're going to harp on a company for forcing you to view ads, go after EA. Nothing is worse than trying to tee off on a hole in Tiger Woods and having a bright red and yellow McDonalds ad pop up on the scoreboard during your back swing.