The Internet Just Made Microsoft Kill a Car for a Faster Horse

MS wants to sell precisely one license but support both never-connected machines and cloud lending, but this was too hard for them to figure out and they're dropping the cloud part.

The cloud lending facility required expiring leases (think DHCP) to guard against the possibility of a purchaser intentionally stranding their license at a friend's house (or on a dead xbox, or one that loses internet connectivity), where that friend would play happily for weeks without connecting to the network.

If you believe in the effectiveness of copy-proof-disc DRM, then a single token permitting ongoing play can certainly just reside on the disc.

How about this:

1. disc alone doesn't suffice to play a game on an unconnected xbox (so never-connected users are out of luck)

2. net connected xbox alone can acquire the right-to-play token as long as the previous holder of the token is online. (physical disc from store would need insertion only on first use to create the initial on-net token).

3. an unconnected xbox that was the last one to use the net token may continue to play indefinitely without net access, provided the disc can be validated. this does allow simultaneous play of at most one online and one disc, but only as long as the xbox stays intentionally unconnected (this limits the number of extra licenses to at most 1, unlike a more lenient cloud-lending policy that allows continued play without check-ins).

I believe the renew-lease-every-24hr model already allowed simultaneous play in case of the last token holder being offline (if the game didn't require a connection to play, that is).

If absolutely prohibiting simultaneous play from a single purchase is a must (and I don't see why it should be; an average concurrency of strictly less than 2 sounds fine), then you just need to require explicit lease releases (and the disc becomes irrelevant again), which has an obvious customer service overhead when people can't release for whatever reason.

Alternatively they could implement a physical 'disc destroyer' that can move a game (one-way) to the cloud phone-home mode. Or just require an xbox to phone home before permitting a new disc (giving up on never-connected xboxes), in which case no physical destruction is necessary.

This one is especially amazing: "You could re-sell your physical disc game to Gamestop or any participating outlet that opted into Microsoft’s revenue sharing system." Gee, thanks, Microsoft! It's not like those outlets will pass the cost right onto the consumer or anything (oh wait, they will). It's incredible how the Xbox team thought, "Look at that money over there. Let's take it!" What's next, Wal-Mart charging Ralph Lauren every time a customer comes in wearing a Polo shirt (because why should other clothing companies get free advertising in their store)?

The other issue? For the author to be completely honest, every "benefit" mentioned in the article should have "for a fee" added to the end of it. It's not very fun or innovative to get nickeled and dimed every step of the way. The fact that the public received 3 different messages about digital sharing costs (the three being no cost, a small fee, and the full price of the game) didn't help matters, either.

Another issue I had with the digital system is with the games themselves. Most critics of physical media on Xbox One mention the iOS model, but fail to note how Xbox One is different from it. If I download an app on my iPad, it instantly shows up on my iPhone and my iPad mini, ready for use. I don't have to pay any extra usage fees for multiple devices. The apps themselves are in the $0-$10 range. Most importantly, most apps run in the 5-50MB range, so downloads are quick and my apps are ready to go in minutes. Compare that with Xbox One, where games are likely to be in the 10-20GB range and $60.00 (formerly with fees for sharing and resale). If you consider sharing to be going over to a friend's house, entering your password, then waiting 3.5 hours for a download to finish to be in some way innovative or interesting, then you are clearly not the target market for this device. Gamers want instant gratification, not waiting around for downloads and jumping through hoops.

The last point I want to make is this: the author, Jason Chen, is a fool if he thinks that replacing one black box in front of a TV for another is in any way comparable to upgrading from a horse and buggy to a car. The DRM-laden, no-money-left-behind nature of Xbox One in the context of tech in 2013 (a jungle of price fixing, nickeling/diming, credit card storing, and "convenient" subscription modeling) is precisely the status quo that consumers are finally revolting against.

1. Converting to cloud could require users to trade in the physical disk at a local store for a digital CD key. A pain for users but by making this a known requirement up front, users won't be able to complain about it and it may convince users who are on the fence to just get the digital copy from the start.

2. Require all games to have a CD Key (acts as the same key for converting to cloud) and a small footprint installable component. Tell users that you don't need an internet connection to validate but if you do connect to the internet, the Xbox One will periodically "phone home" and check to see if your CD keys are legitimate. It won't stop sharing the physical copy after converting to cloud, but it would make it much more of a hassle and prevent multiplayer games from being shared easily. Bonus for users who are converting - the digital version of the game can be installed via the disk so they don't have to wait to download the game to convert it to the cloud. This would also make reinstalling much faster so long as users keep the physical copy.

There are many other possibilities that have been mentioned already so I'll stop here. Just note that this isn't an either or situation. There is a lot of flexibility here.

The idea that a game would ship which allowed users to set up their own networks and play their buds seems alien. Instead, many franchises shut down their subscription service after a couple of years - e.g. to force the upgrade from FIFA 12 to FIFA 14.

I remember Quake - the free demo, and fragging my coworkers over the Novell after hours to the point that my wife would call the office...this was before cell phones...just to make sure I wasn't really out drinking and perhaps chasing skirts.