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Penny Arcade: the ugly, profitable details about Xbox Live dashboard ads

squidyj

Member
I'm used to corporate apologists by now but this is still a crazy post.

Just wanted to point that out.

I'm used to being called a corporate apologist by idiots by now but that was a really bizarre post.

Microsoft is making money capitalizing on ads and yet it's still cool for them to charge for xbl and hide things behind that paywall? wat. We should probably just give MS our banking information and let them take what they want.
 

GraveRobberX

Platinum Trophy: Learned to Shit While Upright Again.
I don't get how people continue to bitch about this. If you know the alternative press on. It is amazing how much energy people spend on things like this and will be the same people that claim they just want to play games. Go in the settings launch game from disc insert, done.

Knowing Sony, somehow they will fuck this up somehow

More maintenance's, store update is now Bi-Weekly!... too much work on a weekly basis

Load up games and ads in a timely manner, what do you think they are machines?
 
And yet I don't have to pay anything to get the same TV stuff and play games online on the ps3.

Yeah, except in my experience you don't get the same quality of service on PS3.

I tried to download Rainbow Moon on my PS3 and it took TEN HOURS. This is a 2GB file. My Xbox would download that in less than half an hour. And isn't the chat on PS3 still fucked? Or did they finally fix that?

Maybe other people have had a better time with PSN than I have, but I've never once regretted that I have to pay for Live because I feel that I'm getting a better service as a result.

For me. Personally. In my opinion. /Disclaimer.
 
LOL MICRO$OFT AMIRITE!!!

Seriously, they're a business, they're supposed to make money, why are we grudging them the chance to make money? If someone wants to pay $350k for an advert, let them. It's their money.

The adverts really aren't intrusive beyond the first day. You'll know exactly where everything is to click to it without even looking, and if you want a game just type it into Bing and you'll have it in seconds. The only people bothered by adverts are the people that set out to notice them. Everyone else can just get on with life.

Also, your $60 is for online play and some TV stuff. It has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with advertising. There is no relation whatsoever.

Downloading one demo from Microsoft's servers most likely costs them more in bandwidth than your entire year of playing games online. Almost none of your money is "going towards" you playing games online on their end.

Edit: Ads should be gone or XBL should be free, really. As it is they probably stand to make more money from ads than XBL subscriptions, and they would probably make even more if they didn't have the 60$ barrier.
 

ZenaxPure

Member
I'm thinking it will look like this but with the movie they want you to rent will be in the middle instead:

http://zgp.org/~dmarti/images/idiocracy-tv.jpeg[/IM/G][/QUOTE]

Fixed that for you. The game you want to play will be about 4 tabs to the right of that.
 
What's wrong with it? I only ask because your post contains nothing of substance.

Because paying monthly to play online, use netflix or most other services AND being bombarded with a million ads coupled with the fact that the new dashboard is shit is a great way to drive your customers away. Its a shitty experience.
 
Looking forward to your post in a few years defending the unskippable commercials that play before you can press "start" on your new Xbox 720 game.
"You only have to sit through them a few minutes, I don't see the big deal!"

Didn't Wipeout HD run ads in-between tracks for a very short time?

But nevermind me. I'm stepping out because even after over five years of arguing absolutely zippo has changed.
 
Because paying monthly to play online, use netflix or most other services AND being bombarded with a million ads coupled with the fact that the new dashboard is shit is a great way to drive your customers away. Its a shitty experience.

No, no, let him answer.

Didn't Wipeout HD run ads in-between tracks for a very short time?

:lol

Also, when I sign into PSN I'm confronted with a page of nothing but adverts. At least on Xbox the "play game" button is there.
 
Downloading one demo from Microsoft's servers most likely costs them more in bandwidth than your entire year of playing games online. Almost none of your money is "going towards" you playing games online on their end.
A demo is a sales tool. Its putting the product in the consumer's hands.

Why should we be concerned with paying for that infrastructure in the first place?
 
Looking forward to your post in a few years defending the unskippable commercials that play before you can press "start" on your new Xbox 720 game.
"You only have to sit through them a few minutes, I don't see the big deal!"

Feel free to look me up in a few years in case there are unskippable commercials that I would assumedly somehow support, and I'll be happy to let you slap me on the butt with a wad of meat. Till then, let's not get crazy.

If you want to see how people act when it's time for unskippable things, check out the old Devil May Cry 4 Requires Installation on PS3 thread. Some of the justification for it in there was incredible.
 
The current dashboard is fucking awful. I love how the blocks that aren't actually ads are tiny and off to the side.

Why would I want the functions of the product prominently displayed when I can have huge animated ads shoved in my face.
 

jvalioli

Member
LOL MICRO$OFT AMIRITE!!!

Seriously, they're a business, they're supposed to make money, why are we grudging them the chance to make money? If someone wants to pay $350k for an advert, let them. It's their money.

The adverts really aren't intrusive beyond the first day. You'll know exactly where everything is to click to it without even looking, and if you want a game just type it into Bing and you'll have it in seconds. The only people bothered by adverts are the people that set out to notice them. Everyone else can just get on with life.

Also, your $60 is for online play and some TV stuff. It has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with advertising. There is no relation whatsoever.

The ads are to offset the cost of running the service.

Businesses are there to make money is the weirdest argument ever. If microsoft could get away with asking 100$, does that mean that they should?
 

GraveRobberX

Platinum Trophy: Learned to Shit While Upright Again.
Sony would be stupid not to. So MS is making tons of money on Live subscriptions, raking in money hand over fist on ads, and people think Sony is not going to try and get a cut of the pie? Its not like free multiplayer and limited ads are helping them sell consoles. If Sony doesnt implement something similar next gen someone should get fired.

Somehow Sony will find a way to fuck it up

More maintenance's, store now updates bi-weekly

I mean ad + store up front in a weekly manner, what do you think they are, machines?
 
The thing I hate is the video adds. I'm sitting on the couch next to my sleeping 6 month old as you hear the soft "ping" of the cursor skipping accross the panels. It's kind of hard to tell exactly where you are sometimes and then you go over a video add by mistake and get blasted with "CHECK OUT THIS MOVIE OMG OLD SPICE IS THE SHIT PLAY HALO NOW!!!" followed by explosions and dubstep.
 

AppleBlade

Member
What else am I supposed to do if I want to play Gears 3 or Halo online?
...play PC or PS3 shooters? Gears and Halo are good but I'm pretty sure you could survive with Call of Duty, Killzone, Battlefield, Team Fortress, etc.

It would be pretty awesome if gamers could stop playing their console warz BS and rally together to generate enough "controversy" to get Microsoft to stop some of their douchery. The fact that you have to pay Microsoft to access Netflix not to mention to do p2p gaming and on top of that you have a bloated interface with ads is pretty friggin' ridiculous. It pisses me off that intelligent people on gaming forums can not detach themselves from their platform biases to see the big picture. Imagine if Apple started charging you a monthly fee so you could access Facebook and Netflix on your iPod touch or iPad . . . and at the same time started putting ads on your home screens. People would go nuts.
 

Danielsan

Member
A demo is a sales tool. Its putting the product in the consumer's hands.

Why should we be concerned with paying for that infrastructure in the first place?
He's simply making a point that demos are free to download, whilst they cost MS far more bandwidth than any online multiplayer gaming ever will.
 
The ads are to offset the cost of running the service.

Businesses are there to make money is the weirdest argument ever. If microsoft could get away with asking 100$, does that mean that they should?

If you ran a business and people wanted to pay $100 for something of value, wouldn't you charge it?

If you answer "no," then you're either lying or a terrible businessman.
 

TheOddOne

Member
Looking forward to your post in a few years defending the unskippable commercials that play before you can press "start" on your new Xbox 720 game.
"You only have to sit through them a few minutes, I don't see the big deal!"
Then it would be the game fault that it's implemented? Don't know where you are going with this.
 

KAOz

Short bus special
Actually I wonder what Sony charges for the advertising ticker on the XMB that can't be removed.

I've seen this ticker mentioned quite often, but in all honesty, I have never ever seen it myself. And I own a Ps3, and am online alot.

Where is it located? And can it be, that I managed to somehow turn it off indeed. Because, I remember an old one with scrolling text, but managed to turn that off somewhere in the settings when it was introduced.

Is it not an option to turn it off anymore? If that is so, that is shitty.
 
I still have a truly hard time finding the 360 online experience as anything but terrible.

Terrible peer-to-peer (almost nothing server-side, this costs MS pennies), horribly overpriced, littered with ads even if you do pay, terrible UI, taking the multiplayer parts of games you already paid for hostage behind a paywall, hiding a laughable number services available literally anywhere else for free behind said paywall, the absolute worst userbase, and it's the only online gaming service you have to pay for the "privilege" of using.

I'm usually not extremely apprehensive about things one way or the other, but Xbox Live is without a doubt the biggest scam perpetrated on the industry since the Gizmondo. The fact that people actually DEFEND it makes me shake my head in disbelief.
 

DD-11

Member
To all the people complaining, if you were running the company and had to make this decision, you'd make exactly the same one.
 
If you ran a business and people wanted to pay $100 for something of value, wouldn't you charge it?

If you answer "no," then you're either lying or a terrible businessman.
Or you're somebody making the industry more appealing to newcomers, growing the audience and thinking long term rather than short.

I don't begrudge anybody trying to make an honest dollar through innovation, building a better mousetrap, etc. My problem with this article is that it just shows MS moving further and further from gaming, and thus further and further from my own interests.
 

Sean

Banned
Thank God for the XMB. Hopefully Sony doesn't trash that next gen.

Well ever since firmware 3.0, the PS3 boots up to a "What's New" section full of ads which is pretty similar to the XBL dashboard. The big difference is that you can disable that default setting though.

ps3-firmware_1.jpg
 
I'm pretty surprised how many people in here struggle with a UI. It's like if my parents were handed a new remote and told to go to the source button - they'd read every button (they're older folks now) - do you all just not know how to efficiently navigate a UI? Even Xbox 360's UI, while not being perfect, is still extremely efficient if you have a grasp on what it does. I prefer the PS3's UI, but the 360 is far, far from unusable.
 

mboojigga

Member
Looking forward to your post in a few years defending the unskippable commercials that play before you can press "start" on your new Xbox 720 game.
"You only have to sit through them a few minutes, I don't see the big deal!"

If that happens we deal with it then. Why are you worried about unknown scenarios. Even then I won't be defending or complaining. I will still be busy playing games to be concerned about ads. I hope none of you actually drive or go to the mall or movies. Cause some of you should have already had a mental breakdown over ads.
 
As terrible as the 360 dashboard is, it doesn't bother me too much, because it's just a signpost on my way to a game. Unless ads start showing up in games beyond what I consider reasonable (product placement, real-life mimic billboards), I'm not going to get indignant.

The only thing that really annoys me is that the "games" tab isn't the main tab.
 

mrklaw

MrArseFace
Also, your $60 is for online play and some TV stuff. It has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with advertising. There is no relation whatsoever.

online play that doesn't use any MS servers so no major costs, or the TV services that come from third parties using their bandwidth, and that are free to access on every single other platform that offers them.

Paying for live doesn't necessarily mean no ads - look at subscription TV. XBL gold is shit value, but the ads are a separate issue.
 
Well ever since firmware 3.0, the PS3 boots up to a "What's New" section full of ads which is pretty similar to the XBL dashboard. The big difference is that you can disable that default setting though.

ps3-firmware_1.jpg

Allow me to be a fanboy for a second, but it must have been so easy to change that, that I don't even recall doing it
 
Well ever since firmware 3.0, the PS3 boots up to a "What's New" section full of ads which is pretty similar to the XBL dashboard. The big difference is that you can disable that default setting though.

ps3-firmware_1.jpg

Wow, I've never seen that. I guess I had it disabled before that update.
 
V

Vilix

Unconfirmed Member
Looking forward to your post in a few years defending the unskippable commercials that play before you can press "start" on your new Xbox 720 game.
"You only have to sit through them a few minutes, I don't see the big deal!"


I'm surprised it's not a requirement to play demos. Seriously. I thought demos would cost 50 points, or free if you watched a 10-15 spot.

I stopped watching videos on YouTube a while back. Too many damn commericals.
 
Or you're somebody making the industry more appealing to newcomers, growing the audience and thinking long term rather than short.

I think outside of Outraged from NeoGAF, nobody really cares about these adverts at all. If you ask the average Xbox 360 owner how annoyed they are by adverts, the response will probably be "what are you talking about?" in most cases. People don't care.

People here just want to be pissed at something and adverts are an easy target because you don't have to think too hard about it. Just hope that nobody mentions that magazine you just bought or that cinema ticket you paid for or the television service you subscribe to.
 
Didn't Wipeout HD run ads in-between tracks for a very short time?

But nevermind me. I'm stepping out because even after over five years of arguing absolutely zippo has changed.

Sony put advertisments on the loading screens inbetween gameplay. The ads being there actually made the load times longer.
 

Jucksalbe

Banned
toythatkills
Corporate Lickspittle
(Today, 09:44 PM)

Really, though, the ads on the 360 have become so bad with the last dashboard update that I really even turn that console on anymore. It's never been my main console, but lately my Wii has been used more than the 360.
 

heyf00L

Member
Well ever since firmware 3.0, the PS3 boots up to a "What's New" section full of ads which is pretty similar to the XBL dashboard. The big difference is that you can disable that default setting though.

ps3-firmware_1.jpg

One difference is that these ads are about games.
 

Rebel Leader

THE POWER OF BUTTERSCOTCH BOTTOMS
Wonder how much stuff like this boils Sony exec's blood. Their system is free to play online, doesn't fuck customers eyes full of ads at every given second, and yet for their own misdemeanours most of the internet refuses to forgive them, villifies them at every turn, and they experience lower sales on their hardware.

But if they dared add ads, or went subscription for online, the internet shitfit would be legendary. Real catch 22 shit because Microsoft took their 'community' as hostages fast and early.



It would depend on how & where they would put them
 

Kelegacy

XBOX - RECORD ME LOVING DOWN MY WOMAN GOOD
Sorta like cable television.
DVR. Never are an ad again.

In some ways, Gold should be like a DVR. You pay to skip the commercials.

Gold is a scam. If your game comes with multiplayer as a feature and you just paid for it, you should be able to play online. Just like every other device that exists. Isn't Live the only machine that requires you to pay another fee to play online?

And now with all the ad revenue made public...yes, it is a scam.
 
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