Dexter111 said:
It's basic stuff, a few server farms spread around the world containing of mostly database and content servers and a few others specialized to handling other stuff. I've studied computer sciences and did my fair deal of both programming, hosting and support to know that it comes nowhere near the cost of their revenue.
You are, of course, entitled to your opinion that it's
basic stuff dealing with the operation and maintenance of the XBL network. Especially since you studied computer science and did your fair share o---you know what, I somehow doubt the extent of that, as anyone with knowledge in the field is able to scratch past the surface of the service and see the complexity that lies beyond.
Do they
need the revenue from XBL that they make with the subscriptions? For the services they are providing right now, and for the continuous expansion of it... yes. Does all of it go into XBL? No. Of course not. Any company not wanting to make a
profit off their product is a bad company. And we all know that MS is having an easy time there.
To think anyone would even complain about that pizza with a drink (the cost of a monthly XBL sub) is just, well, unnecessary.
They make somewhere around 625 million $ out of membership fees a year at 12.5 million "Gold members" and will increase that to over 750 mill with this price increase. Furthermore only by selling "virtual items" like clothing and similar bullshit they rake in another 600 mill a year. And those numbers don't even include the profit on the initial game sales and "DLC" + bonus content etc. they get a ~15% cut out of and advertisements either.
I'm beginning to think you just don't like Microsoft and them making money. That's not necessarily the best base for a discussion, good Sir. That's like me mouthing off on having to pay for the VISA for a 2 day trip to the US because I don't like funding their dep of home-whatnot.
Steam for instance is so nice and has a list of stats related to their content servers around the world and their bandwidth usage (they have somewhere around 25 million+ total accounts) and most of the games on there are usually download only including free updates, new content and the likes: http://store.steampowered.com/stats/content/
STEAM does by no means offer the same functionality as XBL has. Not trashing STEAM here, mind you. I love STEAM. I'd still love it if they ended up charging me, though their focus will hopefully not shift into the direction that would require that.
We're not talking a private firm that has a server rack in a datacenter somewhere and has to pay out of their ass for bandwidth and service either, but big corporations with lots and lots of earnings and benefits on having lots of servers and mass bandwidth (and I don't know what software they use for basic hosting but could get a lot of licenses even in-house) and there's been enough examples of similar services that are operating for free or still make profit out of advertisement e.g. Battle.Net, Steam, GameSpy, Impulse, PSN... and there's dozens of free "Social platforms" that basically do the same and require a similar constellation of hardware and support staff too.
No. We are not talking about a private firm. Though if you think MS is getting their hardware, staff and network connectivity for free (which I know you are not, however it had to be said), then you are.. ah, I leave it hanging there.
.. At that note though I can't for the life of me think of another social gaming platform thats free and offers the same functionality. I mean. Sure. STEAM gets pretty close. But it doesn't have the bells and whistles that XBL is trying to sell. What am I saying.
Is selling. And will continue to sell. 'cause really now, their price tag is ridiculously low. Unless you don't earn money. Then you shouldn't be playing games anyway, but tending to school instead or finding a job. Or get money from your parents.
