For a long time now, Microsoft has made the rather lofty claim that the company’s XBox 360 was the biggest social network on TV. For the most part that was in reference to XBox Live – the games console’s online service – and its integration with Windows Live Messenger, Microsoft’s cross platform Instant Messaging service (Windows, Mac and mobile). Yesterday, however, Microsoft announced at E3 that the XBox 360 will soon be adding support for two competing social networks – Twitter and Facebook – making the XBox 360 undoubtedly the most socially networked set-top box, but not necessarily a Microsoft-owned social network the biggest one on the television. I’m not sure how Windows Live Messenger user numbers and Facebook’s compare in terms of cross-over with XBox Live membership but it’s nonetheless significant that Microsoft has chosen to embrace two competitors.
One of the advantages of the company’s connected vision was supposed to be the advent of interactive television based on what the Internet could bring to the table. Think: live instant messaging through the TV with friends while watching the same channel or accessing additional information pulled in from the web, for example. With yesterday’s announcement that satellite broadcaster BSkyB’s broadband TV service ‘Sky Player’ is coming to XBox 360 users in the UK and Ireland, that vision is now a lot more tangible.
In a joint announcement, Microsoft and Netflix have put out some numbers on the success of Netflix’s ‘Watch Instantly’ Internet TV service on Microsoft’s XBox 360 games console. 1.5 billion minutes of Netflix content has been streamed, with a total of one million Xbox Live Gold Members activating Netflix on their accounts. Considering that Netflix on XBox only went live three months or so ago, that’s pretty impressive by anybody’s measure.
November 5th, 2008 | Posted in Net TV | Comments Off
More Netflix news…
Netflix is promoting trials of its ‘Watch Instantly’ streaming video service with select Xbox 360 games, reports Streaming Media’s Dan Rayburn.
In a joint marketing effort with partner Microsoft, a 48 hour ‘Gold’ pass to XBox Live that includes the Netflix promotion, can be found in the box of US retail copies of the newly released James Bond game, although access to Netflix on XBox 360 won’t be available until later this month when the previously announced Dashboard update is rolled out. Rayburn says this is the “the beginning of what is expected to be some massive marketing efforts by both Netflix and Microsoft for the new service.”
November 3rd, 2008 | Posted in Net TV | Comments Off
Last week Engadget reported that the XBox 360’s support for Netflix streaming would include a limited amount of HD content too – initially around 300 titles – prompting many to ask if High Def content would also make its way onto Roku’s Netflix set-top box.
Dan Rayburn quickly followed up to confirm that, despite the lack of an official company announcement, Roku’s hardware was at least technically capable of streaming Netflix in HD, leading to speculation that Netflix HD streaming could be a Microsoft exclusive, for the time being anyway.
Although the UK version of Microsoft’s Video Store for its XBox 360 console launched last December, it wasn’t until just over a month ago that I got to try out the service for myself. Microsoft’s PR team kindly loaned me a top of the line model – the HDMI equipped 120GB “Elite” version – to hook up to my High Definition TV to download and watch a few shows and movies purchased from XBox Live. However, while the service is dead easy to use and worked as intended, for a number of reasons I came away disappointed.
I’ve often wondered this, but my math skills suck. How big of an impact is Internet-delivered video really making in the consumer living room?
Dan Rayburn, the EVP of StreamingMedia.com and the blogger behind BusinessofVideo.com, crunched numbers in a post for GigaOm today and decided that the impact is not nearly as large as we think.
“While it is good to see more content options coming to consumers, adding up all of the install numbers for these devices gives a stark picture of just how small the install base really is,” Rayburn wrote. “The market is still too fragmented, with too many different devices, all limited by a lack of premium content.”
Rayburn bases his analysis on market penetration rates. His point is that the best technologies don’t always win — it’s what consumers adopt. The numbers for TV-connected devices are interesting.
Now it’s official that Netflix is coming to the Xbox 360, although not until this fall, we’re as curious as the next person to see just how well it’s been implemented. Luckily, Inside XBox has published a brief – and we mean brief – video walk-through of the new feature.
Initial impressions: the UI is slick, and the integration between the XBox 360’s newly designed dashboard and Netflix.com, where you still manage your Watch Now cue, works as expected. We’re not sure what kind of Internet connection they were using, but movies start playing almost immediately. Check out the video for yourself after the jump.
Later today, a version of the BBC’s iPlayer will be made available on Nintendo’s Wii games console, announced the UK public broadcaster’s Future Media and Technology chief Erik Huggers during a keynote speech at the MipTV-Milia conference in Cannes.
Alongside download (Windows-only) and streaming versions (Windows/Mac) accessible via a computer, the BBC has already built a version of its UK-only TV catch-up service for Apple’s iPhone and iPod touch devices. Today, however, marks the first time the iPlayer will be available on a games console, and perhaps surprisingly, not one designed specifically to be a media center. So much for the ‘trojan horse into the living room’ strategies of Sony’s PS3 and Microsoft’s XBox 360.
The ability to port the streaming version of iPlayer to the Wii was made possible because of Nintendo’s original decision to offer a Web browser for the console, and one that supports Flash Video (see last100’s ‘Five resources to create a Wii media center‘). The PS3 also features a full Web browser with the Flash plug-in, so perhaps we can expect that to be next on the list.
In a joint announcement, Microsoft and Netflix have put out some numbers on the success of Netflix’s ‘Watch Instantly’ Internet TV service on Microsoft’s XBox 360 games console. 1.5 billion minutes of Netflix content has been streamed, with a total of one million Xbox Live Gold Members activating Netflix on their accounts. Considering that Netflix on XBox only went live three months or so ago, that’s pretty impressive by anybody’s measure. 
Netflix is promoting trials of its ‘Watch Instantly’ streaming video service with select Xbox 360 games, reports 
Last week Engadget 
Although the UK version of Microsoft’s Video Store for its XBox 360 console launched last December, it wasn’t until just over a month ago that I got to try out the service for myself. Microsoft’s PR team kindly loaned me a top of the line model – the HDMI equipped 120GB “Elite” version – to hook up to my High Definition TV to download and watch a few shows and movies purchased from XBox Live. However, while the service is dead easy to use and worked as intended, for a number of reasons I came away disappointed. 
I’ve often wondered this, but my math skills suck. How big of an impact is Internet-delivered video really making in the consumer living room?
Later today, a version of the BBC’s iPlayer will be made available on Nintendo’s Wii games console, 
