Microsoft Still Launching Xbox TV This Year
Microsoft's Xbox TV will arrive here in the States this holiday season.
Last week during Microsoft's financial analyst meeting, company CEO Steve Ballmer said that the upcoming Xbox TV platform will launch this holiday season. He indicated its release while previewing the service in front of a captive audience, but refrained from offering specifics like the actual release date, content partners, pricing and the available content at launch.
Instead, Ballmer told the audience that Microsoft would be working alongside "dozens of hundreds of additional video content providers." And in addition to video on-demand, the new platform will also provide live TV spanning news, sports, and numerous popular channels. The service will be similar what Microsoft has already done overseas with Sky TV in the United Kingdom, Canal Plus in France, and FoxTel in Australia.
But the key factor in making Xbox TV succeed where other attempts have failed will be Kinect, Microsoft’s motion-sensing device. "Having all of that content is right on, it's fantastic, but it brings a new challenge with it," Ballmer said. "Certainly we all know the frustrations of using guides and menus and controllers, and we think a better way to do all of this is simply to bring Bing and voice to Xbox. You say it, Xbox finds it."
CNN reports that a Microsoft employee demonstrated Xbox TV using Kinect by shouting "Xbox, Bing 'The Office.'" The TV immediately pulled up all available seasons of NBC's hit comedy TV show for on-demand viewing. The employee then announced an additional voice search that was supposed to allow users to navigate to a particular season or episode. That particular command failed.
"It's a good thing that's shipping for Christmas," Ballmer mused.
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A mix of voice and hand gestures which kinect picks up and translates would be awesome. Swipe your hand left or right to turn pages/channels, flick your hand up or down to change volume, etc. I think its called a "Minority Report keyboard"?
God, why did I renew my Xbox Live for 2 years when it was on sale for $35? Is this what all that money is going to? ESPN, Twitter, Facebook, and other crap I don't need or want.
God, why did I renew my Xbox Live for 2 years when it was on sale for $35? Is this what all that money is going to? ESPN, Twitter, Facebook, and other crap I don't need or want.
Then stop renewing it, go PC gaming instead, DUH!
Lets not forget about the bandwidth caps that ISPs ..*coughCOMCASTcough*...implement. If there is some sort of deal made between Microsoft and these providers, I am willing to bet that would mean either higher rates from the providers or a separate charge for providing this service. Either way, the consumer loses.
Lets not forget about the bandwidth caps that ISPs ..*coughCOMCASTcough*...implement. If there is some sort of deal made between Microsoft and these providers, I am willing to bet that would mean either higher rates from the providers or a separate charge for providing this service. Either way, the consumer loses.
Xbox exists in more places than the USA
***cough***only 5% of the worlds population***cough***
***cough***smaller and more saturated market than Europe, lots of countries of which don't have bandwidth caps***cough***
A TV that gets the RROD, that would be funny.
Xbox exists in more places than the USA***cough***only 5% of the worlds population***cough******cough***smaller and more saturated market than Europe, lots of countries of which don't have bandwidth caps***cough***
Yes, yes, but that 5% has about 20 million of the 55 million 360s out there, so you can understand why Microsoft might want to focus on that demographic?
Plus, like the article said there are similar implementations from Microsoft in the UK, Canada and elsewhere...
Yes, yes, but that 5% has about 20 million of the 55 million 360s out there, so you can understand why Microsoft might want to focus on that demographic?Plus, like the article said there are similar implementations from Microsoft in the UK, Canada and elsewhere...
I think the point I was trying to make was that COMCAST do not exist anywhere else outside the USA.
There are more consoles been sold by all makers in the USA but Europe has a higher population.
Therefore there is more room for growth in that market before saturation, also the deregulation and competition that exists in various European broadband markets mean that there are plenty of very good providers with no bandwidth caps.
I think the point I was trying to make was that COMCAST do not exist anywhere else outside the USA.
Fair enough, but Xbox TV won't exist anywhere outside the USA from what I gather either... At least for the near future.
Fair enough, but Xbox TV won't exist anywhere outside the USA from what I gather either... At least for the near future.
Actually, looks like the USA is already late to this party as well.
I actually don't care about the Kinect integration part, but when it comes out, I'll be looking at Xbox LIVE TV vs a cable bill