Microsoft's Yusuf Mehdi: We Need To Educate Consumers

[Jedi-Hunter4]

I'm going to start using the word c***s when talking about Xbox, just frankly total arrogance, you are the division of a company that designs game consoles, in the rung of things you are at the bottom of the pile in terms of contribution to society. In Maslows hierarchy of needs you come in as a thought second to every other need. They fill a gap in peoples free time and they have the arrogance to suggest we all are just too thick to understand what they are trying to do. I f'ing understand very, very, well, your trying to f*** the consumer.

They are trying to give us an advance in graphics, while still giving us 90% very lazily produced games, and a few features we have other devices for such computers. While in exchange taking all of our consumer rights and rights of ownership. You don't see car manufacturers trying to charge people a fee to exchange the keys for cash of their vehicles.

I could actually possibly even a tiny amount believe the shight they are pushing, if it were not for the fact that info off posted games on amazon and other rumor mills were not suggesting the games themselves will be around double the cost of release games on the current systems. So XBox want us to pay double, to not really own our games and if we dare sell them on or lend them, they want a cut, You would have to have too much money to care or be on some very powerful drugs to even consider that. Let alone they other online restrictions, the spying on the customer and the as yet compleatly unjustified extra cost, which seems to have been brushed off as next to nothing. And for those of us outside the US the figures I have seen say we can expect to pay much much more than our US counter parts.

I don't think I have ever changed my opinion so radically of a company in a matter of days. I've gone from for all intensive purposes a dedicated XBox customer, I've had a history of excellent customer service with them. They have more often than not rewarded me for have live from release to today's date and I've recommended the XBox at every turn as the console for a gamer. Now I actually want to get rid of the thing in utter disgust for the direction they are going and the utter disdain for the gamer base that made them a power in the console market. I really do hope someone has the balls to ask "what the hell are we doing?" and there is a massive U turn on the whole thing.

Bravo XBox I went from wanting to shove my money down your throat to wanting to distance myself from the entire division.

 

[CyberMachinist]

Educated?

They mean this kind of educated don't they: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uEJRmoIDVc (God bless Kubrick)

I'd say we "Educate" Them with this method, I'm pretty sure it will produce stellar and permanent results in both the short and long term. Our charts and data sheets say it works 98% of the time all the time, We firmly believe this to be a viable tactic.

Captcha says Halp meh...... I wonder who will say that?

 

[Racecarlock]

"Ultimately consumers will decide which is better," Mehdi said. "It's a big market."

Source: Ars Technica [http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/06/microsoft-defends-the-xbox-ones-licensing-used-game-policies/]


Permalink

I'm getting a PS4. How's that for deciding better, *****?

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

I'm gonna go through the Ars Technica report here, because there's so much more in it. Bear with me, this is long.

Spoiler: Click to read the bullshit

"This is a big change, consumers don't always love change, and there's a lot of education we have to provide to make sure that people understand."

Alright Microsoft, 'educate' me.

In fact, he said a lot of the way people have responded to Microsoft's moves was "kind of as we expected."

Making me question your sanity is not getting off to a good start.

"We're trying to do something pretty big in terms of moving the industry forward for console gaming into the digital world. We believe the digital world is the future, and we believe digital is better."

Explain.

On Xbox One, having all games exist as cloud-connected downloads enables new features like the ability to access your entire library at a friend's house with a single login

Because carrying the disc over by hand is so fucking arduous, right?

or loaning games to up to ten "family members" digitally and remotely.

Do you need to watch Sony's video again? I think you do.

Those digital "benefits" will be available at launch, but Mehdi hinted that the digital rights management transition might unlock some more interesting game access and distribution methods later on.

I'm not interested in your snake oil, dude. Explain why it's of benefit to me now.

"You can imagine the capability to have different licensing models, different ways that people have to access games," says Mehdi. "This all gets unlocked because of digital."

We already have different ways to access or license games. They include: full price, free-to-play, subscription, shareware, donate-what-you-please, rentals, trial versions... none of this explicitly requires either a cloud or a 24hr connection check.

Mehdi also suggested that the transition to a world of strictly downloadable and online-connected games would help allow for "a diversity of business models" for publishers to take advantage of, from free-to-play titles to $60 AAA games to Xbox Live Arcade games somewhere in between.

Again, how does this require constant digital connection? It already exists.

"As you go into a digital world, what's happening is publishers are choosing to have different business models, and consumers are saying 'Hey, if I can't resell the title, provide me a different way to get value to get into your game.'

Allow me to finish your sentence. "SAID NO ONE EVER." If people have paid for a game and they no longer want it, exactly what benefit is there to them if you change the licensing arrangement? "Good news! You can now get the game free-to-play!" "I already have the game, dipshits."

And we think the market will be efficient in finding good models that work for consumers."

It already has found one. It's called the second hand market.

In essence, Mehdi said, consumer demand for good value from games will drive prices down, even if a publisher decides to fully cut off the market release valve of used game resale.

You bonehead. Competition between vendors drives prices down. You want to create a closed platform with no resale market, and you want us to trust that prices will go down, because pinky promise?

But Mehdi said that Microsoft wasn't simply "giving in" to publisher demands with its new game licensing terms. Instead, it was trying to balance the needs of its four main "constituents," including the consumer (who comes "first and foremost" he said), game publishers, retailers, and Microsoft itself as a company.

You fucking clown. Under your new arrangement, you would not only be the console manufacturer and a games publisher, you would also be a retailer. Is it any surprise then that the majority of policies are actually going to benefit you, rather than the consumer?

"We do want to support everyone in that system, beginning with the consumer," he said, "but we want publishers to get paid for the great IP they work on."

I'm sorry, was that a Freudian slip? Developers work on the game, not the publishers. If you can't even get that right, why should anyone believe that you're putting the consumer first?

Mehdi noted that purely digital game marketplaces like the iOS App Store have thrived despite having absolutely no physical media.

And no real resale market or even the potential for refunds. The ABC show The Checkout recently showed how difficult it is to get a refund from Apple that you are entitled to under Australian Consumer Law. The only reason Apple gets away with it is because the price point for iOS stuff is so small that people chalk up their losses most of the time. Good luck getting that same reaction out of $60 games.

Still, he did concede that, without discs, the licensing norms for the system "would be easier to understand."

Are you somehow implying that people buying discs are under the misguided perception that they actually own the software, and you can't just terminate the service anytime you like? Thanks for clearing up what the big advantage of digital is for you...

On the Xbox One, Mehdi said the company has "tried to? bridge the two in a way that no one has done?to give you the power of digital and then give you all this power in physical.

By having a physical device that only downloads software digitally? I already have one of those you twat, it's called a smartphone. Except the games on my smartphone don't stop working if I fail to connect it to the internet at least once a day...

? We know we're providing a lot more value to consumers, but in that comes a lot of need to clarify 'how come disc, how come digital, how's that work?'

So far I'd give you about 0 out of 10 for clarity.

"I think it's fair to say there's a segment of consumers at this show in particular who really pay attention, who are very passionate about all aspects of gaming, and that we listen to closely.

"WE'RE LISTENING TO YOU! CAN YOU HEAR HOW LOUDLY WE'RE LISTENING TO YOU?"

In a broader set of community, people don't pay attention to a lot of the details. We've seen it in the research, we've seen it in a lot of the data points."

Well that's a swell attitude to have towards your consumers, dickwad, but tell me: what happens when those people who don't pay attention to things like the 24hr check buy an Xbone and discover it doesn't work at their internet-less apartment? They'll be pissed.

"Amazon basically says they are on path to sell out?

Amazon sold out years ago, dude.

Amazon is saying it's one of their best-selling consumer products.

So is Dan Brown's Inferno. Doesn't make either of them any less of a rip-off.

We're seeing the same thing from other retailers."

[citation needed]

While the Xbox One will sell for $100 more than the PlayStation 4, Mehdi suggested that the extra money spent would be worthwhile to consumers looking for the "best value" in their next gaming system.

And that better value would be what, exactly?

Besides exclusive titles and gaming content,

Let's break this down. You pay the publisher a lot of money to make it exclusive to your system. I pay you extra money to get access to it. This is not called 'better value', it's called 'ransom'.

Mehdi said players would see value in the system being "backed by 300,000 servers backed by Microsoft that enable incredible game experiences."

Sounds sweet. Wait, I have to pay extra to actually get any use of out them? How the fuck is that 'better value'? Especially when its competitor service will cost less!

Also, Mehdi said, the Kinect in each box provides for better gameplay and "ease of use for the entire system."

So we're paying for the stupid Kinect. I have yet to see a single game that is actually made better with this thing, and you know it. So rather than pony up and admit it's a dud, you're forcing us to buy it by bundling it with the console. Have you learned nothing from Windows Explorer?

Things like live TV support

Does the console come with a TV? No? Then why would I pay you extra for something I already have?

and exclusive NFL

I'm Australian, I couldn't care less.

and Skype partnerships will also help show consumers the Xbox One's "tremendous value."

Do you think I'm legendarily thick? You own Skype. How is that a 'partnership'? That's you giving exclusives to yourself, for free. It's like saying "Hey, buy an Xbone! You get an exclusive partnership with the Xbone controller!" Not to mention that I already have a myriad of other devices that can run Skype and would probably do it better...

"We want to have our offering be differentiated relative to all others,"

You certainly did that, by crippling it with the most absurd restrictions of any console on the market...

"It has value that is in so many areas that is not in competing systems?

Your grammar is so awful that I think you're the one who needs to be educated, frankly.

 

[Phantom Renegade]

Microsoft needs to realise that when i pay for a console i pay so i can be rid of the hassle of PC gaming, right now the X-box one is basically a expensive Steam that doesnt have deals.

 

[Nazulu]

It has nothing to do with change.

You're forcing DRM and other bullcrap without benefits that could make up for it.

Try again ya dick heads.

 

[bimon_1234567]

What I want to know is if Mehdi was twirling his silent-movie-villain-mustache while making these statements.

 

[unstabLized]

"We believe the digital world is the future, and we believe digital is better."

You can believe all you want, it doesn't make it true.


"There's plenty of benefits in cloud connection, Mehdi claims. You'll be able to take your library with you wherever you go, so long as there's a decent connection."

Anddddd here we go again. Stop shoving "decent connection" down everyone's throats Microsoft. Just stop.


"And the negativity? Well, it may not matter so much to Microsoft. Sure, core gamers complain, but the folks who don't really pay attention and who just want a fancy box will be fine with Microsoft's Xbox One. "In a broader set of community, people don't pay attention to a lot of the details," said Mehdi. "We've seen it in the research, we've seen it in a lot of the data points."

Oh good. Keep middle fingering more of your customers, broad or not. Take those researches and data points and shove it up your ass along with your head. You guys seem to be very good at that.

Just stop talking M$.

"As for DRM and used games, limits and potentially fees are a necessary evil..."

Sony begs to differ.

This,

We need to educate consumers!

As to what those different ways could be or what they might mean for the industry, Mehdi was reluctant to go into details.

We'll get back to you when we figure out what it is, exactly, we plan on educating you about!

And that. Get the hell out Micro$oft.

 

[90sgamer]

Microsoft's campaign appears to be a dedicated effort to make the Xbox fail. The xbox is priced higher than the competition, executives can't get their story strait and those who claim to be in the know are not offering specific details about anything. Why would Microsoft want the Xbox to fail? There must be a long-game strategy in place here, as if someone needs to be convinced that interactive electronic media is a dead end.

 

[Vylox]

OK... not to toot my own horn here... but...
I have college education, military service, and a 168 IQ.... and I need to be educated ¿ on what ?

I deliberately did not purchase the original XBox, I outright refused to buy the XBox 360, and have also blatantly refused to purchase a windows based computer for years now, and yet I, like many other consumers, need to be educated on all of the bells and whistles that the XBoxOne provides me with... how wonderful.

I'll just peg on the Cloud Computing aspect and let the rest slide... I'm a programmer... and have worked as a networking engineer, and I had my MSCNE in the late 90s, and I know for a FACT that cloud computing is nowhere as good as it is touted to be. P2P computing can be wonderful, but it just isn't that damn good yet, as the majority of systems that could actually benefit from it are already powerful enough TO NOT FUXING need it anyhow, with the sole exception being any kind of serious or dedicated artificial intelligence system.


I said this in another thread, and I'll say it here. Why the hell would I want to purchase something that costs more than my 2 year old tablet, that does fewer things than it, worse than it can. My tablet has more power, better graphics capabilities, better processing abilities, and allows for a greater gaming, TV, video, and music experiences, and it was cheaper.

Good job.

 

[The Lugz]

the exact same vibe and over the top over confidence that the little sheep will bleat in line with what microsoft wants..
this just smacks of the 'deal with it' line from before

they REALLY just don't give a microscopic crap, well welldone M$.

 

[balladbird]

Adorable! It speaks to the current nature of the industry that a corporation in backpedal trying to ease a bad stint of PR sounds like a politician trying to apologize without admitting they did something wrong.

"We should probably say SOMETHING to assuage the public."

"You're right. *approaches podium and clears throat* People of the gaming community... we at Microsoft are sincerely sorry... that you are all so ignorant as to not appreciate the quality of our work."

 

[rob_simple]

"You can imagine the capability to have different licensing models, different ways that people have to access games,"

That part stuck out for me the most, because he said it as if it was a good thing, whereas I read it as:

"We now have even more control over you, your property, and your ability to use the services you have paid for."

If I was some sort of kneejerk-reactionist, Daily-Mail-subscribing fucktard this is the point where I'd pull out the old 'people seem to forget George Orwell's 1984 was a novel, not a blueprint' line.

Seriously, is anyone else starting to think this is some weird stock ploy where the guys running the show at E3 are going to buy up all of Microsoft's nuked stock and then immediately announce all their bad decisions weren't actually true so they make a fortune?

 

[Dangit2019]

Wow, it's like, Microsoft are living in a bubble.

It just boggles my mind how ridiculously anti-consumer this is, and the sad thing is, it probably won't fall flat on it's arse.

It represents everything wrong with blind, uninformed consumerism.

Is there anything that's right with it?

The profit of the few quality products that slip into success?

 

[Therumancer]

The odd thing is that I hear him talk about educating the consumers, when really it seems like the harshest critics are those that understand this fully. At the end of the day this all comes down to what is better for Microsoft, in terms of giving them more ways to make money and tighter control over more things, as far as the consumer goes there is little or no benefit. We give up control over what we paid for, make it easier for Microsoft to track and monitor us, and potentially fuel all the money we spend on other things (social services, etc..) through them. In return we get what? A new machine that plays slightly better games than the older one? That's a really fair deal.

I find it ironic when I hear "educating the consumer" when it really seems to amount to "selling them our propaganda".

As far as not liking change, it's not so much change people hate, it's giving away this much power and control over what they buy. Not to mention the fact that these changes generally involve more hoops to jump through and pains in the arse. Instead of just popping in a game to play and getting everything out of it, you now need to have a profile, a separate membership, quite probably registration on the site of the company the game was made by, and then have to put in codes and such additionally to get your "Day #1 DLC" and prove you didn't steal the disc, or at least didn't buy it used and Microsoft and it's corperate allies got as big a cut as possible. Even beyond control issues the entire
process is a giant pain in the butt.

People don't dislike change, they dislike annoyance. If Microsoft developed a matter transporter and could have a disc you control in your hands inside of 15 seconds, beamed down from their digital reconstruction satellite, saving you a trip to the store, that would be cool, and nobody would mind. On the other hand that's not the case here, Microsoft wants to license you things you do not own or control and have no physical presence at all for top dollar, and involving tons of spyware and DRM to ensure your not stealing from them. Using a matter transporter would be new and a lot of change, but not many people would care the way they do about these changes.

 

[faefrost]

There's little I or anyone can say that doesn't point out the idiocy of the condescending. However, he is right. People need education.

Consumers have become lazy. A lot of the time, brighter and shinier means worth our dollar, yen, euro, or peso. You give me two things that I couldn't have before and lived pretty well without, and I'll be ok with the five things you take from me. We have had threads already devoted to re-educating the rest of us that the Xbox One isn't as bad as we thought. And unless these were people planted three to five years ago for this very reveal, I'm going to say these are real people willing to deal with what Microsoft wants to take from them. That's their deal, I honestly wish them luck.

But we all have a hand in this. From DLC to even buying games with DRM... Companies are smarter than we think. Medhi's comments not withstanding. We've shown a tolerance for accepting less. A game's not complete, you can buy the game 'the way it was meant to be played' with day one DLC. DRM that isn't even functioning correctly and prevents you from even playing the game. DLC that isn't DLC but it's in the product. They just withheld it from us and made us pay extra for it.

We ate it up. We decry Diablo 3, it sells millions. We decry Mass Effect 3, it sells millions. We decry Simcity, it sells millions. Without a unified front, why shouldn't Microsoft pat our heads and tell us we'll understand when we're bigger when they take away our toys, only to be given back at their say so?

Without at least 90% of gamers saying we will not take your practices any more, and the loss of income that comes with that which will teach that 'we' in the company's mindset doesn't matter as much as 'we' the very people who you expect to give them their income... Why should they even give a fuck that a good majority of us are angry? I hate to say it, but we have lost. We have lost big time. Not due to their practices, but to our own fractured ranks.

At the time of this post, The Xbox One [http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-One-Console-Day-Edition/dp/B00CMQTVK0/ref=sr_sp-atf_title_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1371162147&sr=8-1&keywords=xbox+one] is number one in video game electronics [http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e334/Revolution1980/xboxone_zpsdc1ad974.jpg].

I mean, that's it. Before we accepted day one DLC, on disk DLC, always online, DRM... all these buzz words that we willingly accepted to play with the new shiny... if any company came out with a console like this, it would have been laughed out of existence. If you told gamers of 2003 they get to have the next game system, but they don't own it, they'll have to pay for an upgraded internet service just to have enough bandwidth to run it, and when the company decides it's done with the system it'll turn into a brick because no servers to connect? You would have been run out of business even before the first product went out. The backers would have saw the response and ran for the hills, not willing to lose their money on such an obvious loser.

But now? Just look up to the links. We don't care. We're willing to be robbed and told to allow it without any resistance. And we listen.

Mehdi couldn't be more right. We need an education. We need a united front. Because our Luxury just changed ownership from us to it, to it owning us. And we're ready to pay 500 dollars for the license transfer*.

*Pun intentional

I think I am a bit more of an optimist that you. People and consumers are as a group brighter than we will often give them credit for. For the most part they reject shit. They don't fear change nor do they avoid it. But they do not like change simply for changes sake. Or change for someone else's sake. They do not however resist change if they perceive a benefit to themselves,a nd will surrender some previous points in exchange for the new benefits. iTunes is a great example of that. The shear convenience of cheap easy and portable songs where you could just buy what you wanted more than made up for the DRM in the consumers eyes. But this is also where MS has so badly fluqed up the XBone. There are no real perceivable benefits to the consumer. At least none that they can perceive. Instead what they see is a crap ton of negatives being badly wrapped up and shoved at them as supposed benefits. SONY by all appearances understood this this console generation, and seems to be poised to reap the benefits of it.

MS will do a decent business. And they will sell out day one preorders. Every console does. They skew the initial numbers to insure they get good press in that way. What will be the determinant is what the 60 day sales are, and how the 3rd party devs are moving. Right now I think they are nervous about the XBox One.

 

[Programmed_For_Damage]

What about the extra $100 you'll be paying for the Xbox One, over the PS4? Again, Mehdi doesn't see a problem with that. The Xbox One will deliver so much increased value over the PS4 that a piddling $100 will be neither here nor there. "Ultimately consumers will decide which is better," Mehdi said. "It's a big market."

Sounds familiar. I wonder where we heard that line before?

"Obviously, it's a higher-risk strategy?as all new inventions are?but if the PlayStation 3 lives up to its total potential, I don't think anyone will be worried about Nintendo or Xbox's cheaper price." Sony CEO Howard Stringer, in 2006, in defence of the $599 price point of the PlayStation 3. We all remember how well the PS3 sold before the price cut, don't we? ;P

You sir are a genius. And how long did it take you to find that quote? Probably not long, but you've done more work than any Microsoft employee tasked with researching and developing the XBone. If Microsoft survive this next console generation (and it's looking grim), you'll be able to cut and paste Mehdi's quote and attach it to whichever console developer is too arrogant to learn from others' mistakes.

 

[Whitbane]

"You can even digitally loan copies - up to a limit of ten - and there could be other, as yet undefined benefits."

Jesus, tell us some of the other benefits. Feeding us these little bits of drivel isn't going to do anything. The console is coming out this year, for fucks sake, learn what the hell it can and can't do.

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

No, Yusuf, no.

You only need to cut out the crap, get your head (and ears) out your ass and start listening to what the people actually want. It's nice you got ideas and such, but, alas, right now I think you're full of shit, and that's pretty bad when you're a major player in consoles, games and gaming content delivery platforms.

I get how your perception got warped, with all that marketingspeak clinging to you like an oil film, that shit never gets off completely, and it all too readily rubs off. I know that. I am aware of that.

Still, with the Windows 8 nonsense not quite over, you come up with the Xbox one and I just cannot but doubt that you are of sound mind. If, say, 95% of all that nonsense you spout makes me believe you don't get me and you don't want my money, I simply don't feel like giving you my money. I think we need to educate you about that one, Yusuf. Pay attention.