Analysis: Why Microsoft's Plan to Ban Modded X-Box 360s was Poorly Planned for the Fourth Quarter
Chances Are Good that it Will Cost Microsoft a Lot of Money
By banning modded X-Box 360s right now, Microsoft is sending a message to not only those customers that have hacked their X-Box 360s, but also to those that are considering purchasing an X-Box 360 in the future. This is especially true for those that will be purchasing on during the holiday shopping season. Microsoft is pushing the fact that they will not stand for those people that use their X-Box-360s in any way other than it was intended.
I was at GameStop the other day and listened to a customer's questions about Microsoft's banning of modded X-Box 360s. The worker tried to explain that this banning was for those people that hacked their X-Box 360. The customer was worried that if her child downloaded any kind of content through the X-Box 360 that this might constitute a reason for a banning for her son's system. She was confused, so she decided to purchase a PS3 instead. I was told by the manager at that GameStop that this was not an isolated incident. They had received over 50 calls that day about the banning.
What Microsoft appears to have forgotten by earmarking this time of year for the banning of modded X-Box 360s is that most of the systems that are purchased this time of year is by parents and grandparents. The game systems that are purchased this time of year are usually done by those that do not have a firm grasp on the industry. Simply put, the systems are usually purchased by people that are fairly clueless about video games.
By the banning of hacked X-Box 360s, Microsoft has alienated these potential customers. Parents and grandparents that do not understand the market might have the same doubts as the customer that I came in contact with at GameStop. Microsoft has a potential of loosing market share this holiday season. Pressing this ban in the middle of the year when sales are softer would have been a much better idea.
There is a saying that I have told many of my customers in the past, and will continue to tell them for many years. "Confusion kills customers." If a customer is confused by something, they are either going to look at another product, or ask a salesperson. Out of those that ask a salesperson, there are many that are going to believe that the salesperson is lying to try to make a sale. From studying customers for so many years, I can tell you with confidence that Microsoft has killed a lot of customers with confusion over the issues with modded and hacked X-Box 360s.
Published by L. Vincent Poupard - Featured Contributor in Arts & Entertainment and Travel
L. Vincent Poupard is known for his insightful news commentaries and unique takes on the entertainment industry. Along with his career in writing, he works as a political/business consultant and has helped b... View profile
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38 Comments
Post a CommentFor those of you that did not notice the earleir posting, I originally spelled Xbox correctly, and it was changed by the editor. I am trying to get it changed back.
It's "Xbox", not X-Box
Read my two follow up articles here:
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2401610/did_microsoft_kill_chances_of_future.html?cat=3
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2401616/analysis_will_sony_ban_your_modded.html?cat=3
you forgot to mention people who got their systems banned and won't be renewing their $60 a year live subscriptions. times a million plus consoles. and why would they when it's free on ps3?
they just shot themselves in the foot. people who have there x box banned will most likely turn to PS3. at my local gamstop and other retailers xbox are not selling much and there are barely any PS3 in the store
Yes, there is no pirating with the PS3, yet. It's just a matter of time until it all catches up. There are many homebrew programs out there running on PS3 right now, and making a homebrew application to run backups will take only time.
Microsoft's banning methods is indeed a mysterious black hole, but we can't do anything about that.
The best way to prevent piracy is to make them very affordable and very accessible. $60 per game is very expensive and with today's stores creating a reservation-or-else policy, it makes it very hard for consumers to actually get a hold of games. (People have to remember that adults are still the number one consumer of video games since they have the money.) I've witnessed quite a few stores denying walk-ins their extra copies because they didn't reserve.
Thats because no pirates care about cracking the PS3. Just like virus writers dont spend a lot of time on the MAC... Cause the market aint big enough!
@Christof: There is no piracy with the PS3. Or else it would have been selling a lot better than it has in the past. Look at the PS2, Dream Cast, all did very well in their first year because they were easily modded without any consequences. Heck the Dream Cast didn't even need a mod chip.
The Xbox 360 mod is surprisingly simple. There is no chip involved. All it takes is to reflash the DVD firmware to a version that did not have a few checks for DRM checksums that a copy could not duplicate. Binary wise the copy is an exact 1:1 duplicate of the original, minus the DRM feature.
There is no cheating involved with the piracy, you still have to live by all the Xbox Live rules. So don't throw out the fact that Microsoft is banning consoles because they are preserving the balance. They are simply reducing piracy and that is the end of it.
Piracy is not right and I'm not here to condone it. But the fact that there are 1 million console users out there that would likely think twic
My biggest problem is the lack of transparency with microsoft's bans. I support an anti-piracy, but a few years back I had a system that was no longer under warranty and gave me random disc read errors.
Would you know it, I was banned. Given it was a second generation system and was getting up there in age, but it should not be band because you mistake disc read errors for something else.
I called up and even offered to send them the system to verify that it had not been tampered and they refused.
I believe microsoft needs a better way to verify that a system is banned and have a way for users to request clarification.
Sounds like you had your X-Box banned...
It's not MS's fault that customers are ignorant. Crime is crime - pirating is a crime and so is being stupid.
Parents should do some research on what they are buying their kids before buying it before little Billy goes on a shooting rampage through school and steals a car then poor Rockstar games gets blamed.
I say good for MS these pirates are now forced to buy a new console to play all the big titles coming out this Christmas season. Well done.