Judge David Shaw of the US International Trade Commission has recommended that the Xbox 360 be banned in the US due to a patent dispute with Motorola over its H.264 video compression technology. When questioned about how that would be fair to consumers, Shaw just said that Nintento and Sony could pick up demand. Nintendo and Sony? Wow, I don’t think Mr. Shaw knows that your maxbox platters don’t go playmation slot. If his colleagues agree with him, the matter will go to President Barack Obama for a final say on the matter.

Source: TDW Geeks.

Microsoft wil soon be releasing a price drop for its Xbox 360 console, but not in a way you’d expect. Yes, you will be able to get the console and Kinect with 2 games for $99, but that’s only if you agree to sign a two year Xbox live gold membership at $15 a month. The total package will cost $459 over the course of ownership. This kind of financing will be critical as console sales took a dive over the 1st quarter of 2012. Are we headed toward the future depicted in Cory Doctorow’s Little Brother, where hapless mall employees dressed in Master Chief armor give consoles away for free in vain hopes of software sales only to have them over-written with a brand of Linux by fresh faced teen freedom fighters? The comments await your response.

Source: Ars Technica

Statistics have confirmed what we’ve all suspected: Over 50% of the 84 hours a month people spend on Xbox live is spent using media apps like Netflix and Hulu. It seems that Microsoft has succeeded in its “Trojan Horse” strategy of turning the Xbox into a digital hub for every medium in the house. Xbox already has Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, ESPN, MLB.tv, and Disney XD on the console. The addition of HBO Go was another plus for the Xbox, since you could previously only get the service on Roku Box. Coupled with the fact that video stores are going out of business everywhere, consumers are now being forced to RTFM and jury-rig their video game boxes into the Media hub they were meant to be.

Source: Gamasutra

Former Sony Game design Chief Phil Harrison has been hired as Chief of Microsoft Game Studios in Europe. This move comes in the wake of Peter Molyneux’s departure from the division to form 22-Cans, an indie start-up. Harrison has served as a partner at the venture capitalist firm London Venture Partners and as a board member at Atari. Most of the press release is a bunch of doublespeak calming investor fears over this management change-up, but Peter Molyneux leaving the Triple-A arena is a good move for him, and the game industry at large. Molyneux’s been criticized for making promises his games couldn’t possibly keep, and that may have been due to all the resources at his disposal at Microsoft. With the economic constraints of a start-up, we may yet begin to see some things come out reminiscent of his old days at Bullfrog.

Source:VentureBeat