Microsoft Xbox 360 Conspiracy Theory

Has anyone considered that the 360 core was more than a considerable waste of time but it was great ploy by MS. Consider that the Core has really no Value due to the lack of a Harddrive. The same Harddrive that is needed to have any true functionality of the system. The truth is that without a Harddrive the system is useless. So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates hence (original 90 day warranty trash). Could a viable solution be to offer a replacement system that does not include a HDD because most people would have their original one from their broken console. How many people went out and bought 2nd and 3rd Cores after they system broke before MS a year later decided to repair for free. Just something to think about. What do you think?

Last time I checked, you could play games without the hard drive. And why would people buy a core to replace a broken system when the repair at the time was under $200?

/conspiracy theory

"So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates"

You'd fix them because hardware failure rates are bad for your image. Case closed.  

Last time I checked, you could play games without the hard drive. And why would people buy a core to replace a broken system when the repair at the time was under $200?

/conspiracy theory

Sicknic

that has nothing to do with the conspiracy theory. 

"So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates"

You'd fix them because hardware failure rates are bad for your image. Case closed.

11Marcel

Not to mention open yourself up to a massive class action lawsuit. 

Has anyone considered that the 360 core was more than a considerable waste of time but it was great ploy by MS. Consider that the Core has really no Value due to the lack of a Harddrive. The same Harddrive that is needed to have any true functionality of the system. The truth is that without a Harddrive the system is useless. So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates hence (original 90 day warranty trash). Could a viable solution be to offer a replacement system that does not include a HDD because most people would have their original one from their broken console. How many people went out and bought 2nd and 3rd Cores after they system broke before MS a year later decided to repair for free. Just something to think about. What do you think?

quest2reign

hey MS isn't sony.

sony intentionally sold defective ps2 in order to count the replacements as "sales", therefore comeing to the "100 million sold" b.s. number....

ms is considerably more ethical than that, as proven by MS' quick admission to problems with some early 360's and did everything they could to fix them for free....

the foil on your hat is a little loose... you might want to tighten it up to prevent the CIA from reading your thoughts...:D

"So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates"

You'd fix them because hardware failure rates are bad for your image. Case closed.  

11Marcel

[QUOTE="11Marcel"]

"So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates"

You'd fix them because hardware failure rates are bad for your image. Case closed.  

quest2reign

[QUOTE="quest2reign"]

Has anyone considered that the 360 core was more than a considerable waste of time but it was great ploy by MS. Consider that the Core has really no Value due to the lack of a Harddrive. The same Harddrive that is needed to have any true functionality of the system. The truth is that without a Harddrive the system is useless. So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates hence (original 90 day warranty trash). Could a viable solution be to offer a replacement system that does not include a HDD because most people would have their original one from their broken console. How many people went out and bought 2nd and 3rd Cores after they system broke before MS a year later decided to repair for free. Just something to think about. What do you think?

tango90101

hey MS isn't sony.

sony intentionally sold defective ps2 in order to count the replacements as "sales", therefore comeing to the "100 million sold" b.s. number....

ms is considerably more ethical than that, as proven by MS' quick admission to problems with some early 360's and did everything they could to fix them for free....

the foil on your hat is a little loose... you might want to tighten it up to prevent the CIA from reading your thoughts...:D

"So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates"

You'd fix them because hardware failure rates are bad for your image. Case closed.

11Marcel

There's a basic theory we study in more advanced classes in college dealing with microeconomics. The basic premise is this - in a market where the seller knows more information that the buyer about an object being sold, with regards to its reliability, features, et cetera - and the seller has no means of communicting this information, in the absense of gurantees such as a return policy or warranty, the market will completely evaporate.

In other words, think of it as an eBay auction with no photos, item description, and a seller with 0 feedback. The auction might say "$100 Xbox 360 ?" - would you put the $100 in? For Microsoft, they want you to feel there's a guarantee you will have what they say you will have - they put out *tons* of information on the system, what it does, the limitations of the core, et cetea - and then they provide a one year warranty and a 30-day return period. They do all of this to create a market for their $400 console.

They put demo units in a store and let you try it out - see what its like - and you can take home the same system you tried out, even the same games you played. Everything is transparent.

There's no conspiracy here - Microsoft does not want your Xbox 360 to break. If you have a broken console you're not buying games (licensing fees), you're not buying accessories (licensing fees), you're not using DLC or LIVE (licensing fees, direct pay-service), and you're losing faith in their product (lost sales). You might as well say "firestone made faulty tires so you'd buy new tires".

[QUOTE="11Marcel"]

"So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates"

You'd fix them because hardware failure rates are bad for your image. Case closed.

subrosian

There's a basic theory we study in more advanced classes in college dealing with microeconomics. The basic premise is this - in a market where the seller knows more information that the buyer about an object being sold, with regards to its reliability, features, et cetera - and the seller has no means of communicting this information, in the absense of gurantees such as a return policy or warranty, the market will completely evaporate.

In other words, think of it as an eBay auction with no photos, item description, and a seller with 0 feedback. The auction might say "$100 Xbox 360 ?" - would you put the $100 in? For Microsoft, they want you to feel there's a guarantee you will have what they say you will have - they put out *tons* of information on the system, what it does, the limitations of the core, et cetea - and then they provide a one year warranty and a 30-day return period. They do all of this to create a market for their $400 console.

They put demo units in a store and let you try it out - see what its like - and you can take home the same system you tried out, even the same games you played. Everything is transparent.

There's no conspiracy here - Microsoft does not want your Xbox 360 to break. If you have a broken console you're not buying games (licensing fees), you're not buying accessories (licensing fees), you're not using DLC or LIVE (licensing fees, direct pay-service), and you're losing faith in their product (lost sales). You might as well say "firestone made faulty tires so you'd buy new tires".

Has anyone considered that the 360 core was more than a considerable waste of time but it was great ploy by MS. Consider that the Core has really no Value due to the lack of a Harddrive. The same Harddrive that is needed to have any true functionality of the system. The truth is that without a Harddrive the system is useless. So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates hence (original 90 day warranty trash). Could a viable solution be to offer a replacement system that does not include a HDD because most people would have their original one from their broken console. How many people went out and bought 2nd and 3rd Cores after they system broke before MS a year later decided to repair for free. Just something to think about. What do you think?

quest2reign

Funny, I though that the most important aspect of a gaming console was being able to play games. The CORE does that.  

[QUOTE="subrosian"][QUOTE="11Marcel"]

"So imagine that you were MS and you knew that your systems would experience severe hardware failure rates"

You'd fix them because hardware failure rates are bad for your image. Case closed.

quest2reign

There's a basic theory we study in more advanced classes in college dealing with microeconomics. The basic premise is this - in a market where the seller knows more information that the buyer about an object being sold, with regards to its reliability, features, et cetera - and the seller has no means of communicting this information, in the absense of gurantees such as a return policy or warranty, the market will completely evaporate.

In other words, think of it as an eBay auction with no photos, item description, and a seller with 0 feedback. The auction might say "$100 Xbox 360 ?" - would you put the $100 in? For Microsoft, they want you to feel there's a guarantee you will have what they say you will have - they put out *tons* of information on the system, what it does, the limitations of the core, et cetea - and then they provide a one year warranty and a 30-day return period. They do all of this to create a market for their $400 console.

They put demo units in a store and let you try it out - see what its like - and you can take home the same system you tried out, even the same games you played. Everything is transparent.

There's no conspiracy here - Microsoft does not want your Xbox 360 to break. If you have a broken console you're not buying games (licensing fees), you're not buying accessories (licensing fees), you're not using DLC or LIVE (licensing fees, direct pay-service), and you're losing faith in their product (lost sales). You might as well say "firestone made faulty tires so you'd buy new tires".

Well the Core / Premium / Elite has more to do with price theory than game theory or complete market failure. Essentially it works like this:

You've got 180 people who want to buy your product divided as such:
80 people want it and are willing to pay $10   ($1800)
60 people want it and are willing to pay $20   ($2000)
30 people want it and are willing to pay $30   ($1200)
10 people want it and are willing to pay $40   ($400)

If we release a product, we want to maximize our profits. In the example above, I would set the price to $20. Why? At $20, 100 people are willing to buy my product, I get $2000. For our example we're assuming the product cost $0 to make - obviously in a more complex example we'd consider the cost of a product, but the theory still works.

But if you're a business, you say "now wait a minute, I just wasted $500!" - there were 30 people willing to pay $10 more, and 10 people willing to pay $20 more for your product. So what do you do? You release a premium or elite model - think of the luxury, sport, or touring edition of a car - it's a few thousand more for features that cost a few hundred to add on.

This is called market segmentation - I want to get each user at their maximum willingness to pay. But what about the low-end users? I've got an $1800 market with the eighty people less willing to pay that I'm failing to tap - bad move. What I'll do is use something like rebates, a gimped system (low-end graphics cards with 128-bit bus, core 360, et cetera). My ideal situation is that the low-willingness to pay users will buy the gimped model, my high-willingness to pay users will buy the luxury model, and everyone else will buy the inbetween model.

Does this happen in reality? Heck no. Segmentation pisses people off - complex rebate forms just make people feel that they were deceived on the price, gimped models just annoy people, and putting a "low ball" item on the table makes people demand the features of the high-end in the low end. It's a complex game - the best player at it right now is Dell, who segments the market through customization and brands it "giving you exactly the computer that's right for you" - some of the worst players at it are the pc component companies with their shoddy rebates and gimped GPUs.

In any case, that's the theory in simple, it gets a lot more complex when we throw in demand elasticity, consumer side price influence, substitutes, competition, and all the other junk that's part of the real world economy.