Xbox Live Going to $60 a year

Seems that Microsoft isn't content with the $50 per year while others charge NOTHING for playing on the internet.

They're raising the price for Live... Sucks. I don't play on Live anymore, though.

But Aron, XBox Live is "the best value in the industry."

I know, I can't believe I saw that tag line...

I have no issue with this to be honest.

I have more fun doing Halo LAN parties than playing online with people I don't know anyway.

The justification is that they are providing more content then they used to for paying members. That's absolutely true. The amount of content and value they've added over the last two years is astounding. Yes, the others offer free online play, but I don't think they're even viewed as competition by Microsoft. Fortunately for Microsoft, many folks that own another system, also own an Xbox. The reality is that they can afford to raise the price because people will gladly continue to pay it. I don't use a all of the new functionality on Live, but I'll still pay for the increase, even though I'm not thrilled about it.

Said By PropellerHed

The justification is that they are providing more content then they used to for paying members.

They really don't, because they don't provide any of the content. In the past two years, they have added Facebook, Netflix, Last.fm, Twitter, and they will be adding Hulu Plus early next year. None of that justifies an increase in price (in fact, none of that should be Gold exclusive at all), and three of those have their own separate fees on top of that. Microsoft is basically charging a tax for the privilege of connecting your 360 to a pair of websites and a few pay services, even though XBox Live itself has nothing to do with any of those things and therefore there are no extra costs incurred. And now they are arbitrarily raising the price $10 each year so they can pocket a bit more money.

Its basically the same as if Microsoft started charging users to use IE to connect to the internet. Now, there may be a legitimate reason for this, but this is the same company that flashes Fujitsu laptop drives with custom firmware and charges 400% over the normal price for them, and who are going to charge $50 for a fucking cord. Furthermore, the only people who can actually use all of that awesome media functionality which should be free anyways are American players, and America wasn't the only place where XBox Live costs increased.

These are good points I didn't consider. It really does suck for international users. They're really getting the shaft.

That being said, I still think that Microsoft didn't have to make any of those services available on the Xbox. They did their customers a solid and added them later on. It's true that some of them require their own service fees, like Hulu and Netflix, but I still find it convenient that I don't have to purchase yet another device to hook up to my TV to stream that content. I would have to spend another 100 bones or so to buy a Roku box or a Western Digital TV Plus (which will just add more clutter and wires to my entertainment system). Since I was already a Live subscriber and was paying for it regardless of these features, it was a huge bonus. Now, even though they will charge me an extra 10 bones per year, I'd have to be paying for the service for 10+ years before recouping the total cost of ownership for an extra device (that will eventually become outdated and I'll want to replace in less then 10 years anyway). It's still something I'm willing to pay a bit extra for.

Granted, I think that having to pay for these features shouldn't be forced on the customer if they don't use them. There should be more pricing tiers for those who choose not to use them. I don't use any of the social networking features, nor would I ever care to. It would be nice if I wasn't being charged for them as part of a larger bundle. So maybe they should come up with a "video streaming" feature charge that's separate from a "social networking integration" charge, etc. That's something I'd appreciate.

Again, why should there be charges for any of them in the first place?

If Blizzard charged for Battle.net... people wouldn't bother playing SC(2).