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The bans won't stop there, either. Rumors indicate Microsoft is aiming to shut off upward of 1 million consoles before the end of the year -- it seems likely that the company may target Europe or another large region next. This hasn't made things easy on Microsoft's call center, which is getting inundated with calls from angry customers. Microsoft's goal is to get all modded consoles off their network to cut down on piracy.
Not all hope is lost for the shunned, though. It seems that Redmond has gone after the console itself, and only prevented it from connecting to Xbox Live. The consoles still function, and the accounts in general appear to be still active, so if you are desperate for online play and don't want to fight Microsoft on it, you can always buy another 360. That's certainly not what many people want to hear, particularly those who view console modding as a right.
This mass banning will undoubtedly renew debates about whether or not hardware modifications should be permitted. Of course, since Xbox Live is an extended service, Microsoft certainly does reserve the right to kick people off -- and this is an example of them demonstrating they are willing to let people go.
User Comments: 80
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To all of you who agree to the wave of bans going on. Screw you! If Microsoft was smart, instead of banning everybody, they could charge a higher rate for the live account of people using modded systems. Why not go that route. They can still make a lot of money that way and I'm positive peolple will complain but they will still pay to be able to play their games online.
Excellent point. Charge $5 more and everyone is happy.
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There is another aspect of the ban that people seem to miss. MS ban modded xbox 360 consoles, they dont ban you as a user. They just dont allow modded units. .... of course people mod the xbox to play pirated games, and I have no problems with that .I download all the time....i ay cath me if you can, but I also have no problem with MS beeing kind and only banning the console....the media industry could learn form -ms in their kindness.
People who complain about the ban, what if someone mod their xbox to cheat at games and then they decide to play agains you? There have been mods like this before, on other consoles in the old days.
Would you like to get your ass kicked time and time again from someone cheating , messing up your stats? All because MS allowed anything on their gameservers, no control , no regulations ... people would really complain then.
The decision is simple, if you want to use live, dont mod your xbox.....but you are allowed to mod it anyway you want and Ms will do nothing to stop it. They will not hunt you down, an their could, (if they can find out about the mod, they could find you throuh live) they will not procecute you...they dont care.....or they would be banging on your door right now.
...instead of banning they could do like hollywood does, hire a shady thugh company to hunt you down, sue you and ruin your life. ... but they dont ... they are not ******. ...but hollywood and the music industry is..
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Well this isn't really anything new, it's also the same thing when playing pirated PC games.
But how about this for a new business model: give away a basic copy of the game for free (or a nominal charge) and then charge more if users want to play online or download DLCs. I think people would be a lot more inclined to spend $50 gradually on DLCs rather than paying $50 upfront. Pretty much all games are going online nowadays and you just have to look at the success of Guitar Hero/Rock Band and the Fallout 3 DLCs, etc.
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Timonius said:
If the reason for modding the 360 is for playing pirated games (and I believe it is) then M$ has all the right to ban people from their live gaming service. They should be thankful there is nothing in place to shut down the 360 altogether.
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Very nice! Very very nice. PS3 rocks.
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my xbox isn't modded - but i was reading about the "cheating" during games on live - what are they talking about - how do you "cheat" at games?
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You are free to mod the hell out of your 360, you just can't play on Live. Microsuck has made this perfectly clear. If you choose to mod, no van pulls up at your house, full of masked MS police who then confiscate your system. They just ban your Live account. You're well within your rights to mod your console if you can handle the consequences.
@ those of you who mod and don't play on live but still benefit from DLC, I guess it just sucks for you
can't have the best of both worlds, eh? -
spikester48661 said:
you can mod your XBOX and your PC.BUT its your PC and XBOX.So if it F,s up its on you not the maker.
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That logic is completely flawed. Yes they will lose the revenue you mentioned, but the amount of money lost on illegal back up disks is far far greater. Most modders tend to have very large libraries of backed up games, and "usually" they aren't back ups just for safe keeping...$60 a pop per game with several games per modder times 600k modders...tons of money saved.
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You know... this was the dumbest move M$ has ever made. People are not gonna continue to buy their shitty game console just to get back on live. If they do re buy one they'll buy a used one on craiglist or a refurbished unit from game stop or they are just gonna buy a new one gut the insides switch the cases and return them to stores. No way in hell would I ever re buy a brand new console from them if I were banned. I backup my games for 2 reasons. A. because i'm sick of spending almost 100 dollars on terrible games like halo wars and feeling ripped off beyond belief because no effort was put into making the game. B. because I want to try the game before I go and purchase it. Modders generate so much revenue for companies. Not everyone just rips off the companies! Modders still pay an online subscription fee, they still purchase DLC, and if they weren't able to get that game in the first place then M$ wouldn't gain any of that HUGE PROFIT MARGIN income. I'm glad I pay from month to month because if they ban me i'm just gonna go buy a ps3 and say **** you to MS. I work at a Best Buy and you should see the amount of people buying MACS and just boycotting windows because of **** like this. Recently I have been selling about 6 macs to every 2 windows systems.
Ms putting your profit way way way above customers is gonna come back and bite you in the *** and I hope it does you greedy ****s.
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tengeta said:
I've played with at least 1.2 million people who abuse their network to get latency in their favor, so this number is perfectly justified.
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lol @ buying a game for $60 and then paying monthly for p2p hosting/matchmaking; Microsoft goes on to harvest a couple extra millions of dollars from those same people when they market a new palette-swapped skin/"horse armor"; then they'll bleed you dry once more to unlock a 'new' map that existed at release and should have shipped with the game that you paid full-price for, etc. Repeat ad nauseam.
Live unwittingly did these folks a service.
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rowey said:
LoL what comes around goes around on both sides.
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if you buy your games then you have nothing to complain or cry about.
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I was banned yesterday for the modded dvd drive. Is there a way to take the xbox apart and replace it with a unbanned used xbox 360 ?
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Timonius said:
Amazing the number of people screaming bloody murder and blaming Microsoft when it is the fault of those who steal, yes steal, games.
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Microsoft is doing this to boost holiday sales.
In 2008 Microsoft sold 1.26 million units, topped only by the Wii and had sold approx. 140,000 units more than the PS3. Since then Sony has dropped the price of the PS3 putting it within competition range of the 360. Furthermore, various console sales predictions have had the 360 coming in last for the past months. If Microsoft bans 1 million 360s and even 1 out of 4 people banned by a new console. that is a boost of 250,000 on top of their holiday sales.
This ban wave was planned and executed to falsely raise the statistics for the Holiday season sales, deceiving the public and making them believe that the 360 community is still the best out there. So when the final stats for holiday season sales come out, don't be surprised to see Microsoft rejoicing because they are the "Best Selling Console" because this is just a manufactured dream that Microsoft by banning modders has fabricated into reality.
Timestorm-cR
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Microsoft will be releasing a new "XBOX" with enhanced features that will deprecate this old XBOX
they want everyone to move into this "next generation" that gives them higher control, and end support for this old one..., they do have some XBOX on stock so.. what better way to try and choke sell some...
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this is a plot made by modders...
they will be releasing their new stealth mod that is not red flaged by microsoft..
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@Guest above - I don't have an xbox and so I'm not into the xbox modding scene, but I'm surprised that a "stealth mod" hasn't been developed already. For other consoles like the Wii and PSP, the modders always seem to be a step or two ahead of the manufacturers.
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I bought a 2nd hand elite console, I was never told its modded and played only legit games yet few days ago I was banned! The most annoying thing is that no matter I'm banned from live which I paid for , is that MS also BLOCK THE ACCESS TO THE HD! So games can't be installed to the HD anymore and you can't use the Media center too. This is totally unacceptable I'm throwing my xbox to the trash and getting a PS3 instead. Bye Bye MS!
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Is it also their right to block any access to the HD and the media center functionality?
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Really the RIAA and the movie industry and Microsoft have every right to sue you. Everything has EULA's the reason the price of game's and such is so high is the number of people pirating. Lets say every banned console has JUST two pirated games most have a lot more. So for example 1,200,000 Million games are pirated so 1,200,000 Times 60 Bucks a game.... that's 72,000,000 Million dollar developers, Microsoft, Retail store, etc lose. If we stopped pirating that money could get given to the people that make the games and the prices would go down..... I stopped pirating years ago its not right how would you like someone to just take your video card out of your computer?
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Hey all of you need to stop and listen ok,
I see why ms are angry but if you actually knew more about modding you would realise that people modding there xbox360 isnt tampering with live at all. It should be the game developers taking action imo.
The only source of modding for xbox live is gamesave modding, that affects online play yes but hardware modding doesnt so i dont see why they are taking such serious action against it for.
mabye a month to 3 month ban would be reasonable like a slap on the wrist but a lifetime ban :S all i have to say that ms are money grabbing arseholes
ft bill gates. -
Guest said:
@realxboxmaster
Switch out the internals of Xbox, and return it with original S/N. Retail store will send it back as a faulty unit.
Yeah... I know that trick already...But MS will catch on because S/N# is embedded within the OS firmware. And all they need to do is track the last IP of where it came from....No matter how you look at they will still find you.....WWWWWoooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhahahahaaaahhaahahaha
lmao......good 1 though
RxM
compdata said:I understand the logic behind people who pirate software as i was in that camp at one point as well. However the problem is exactly what some others have mentioned: Entitlement. The truth is that it doesn't matter how ridiculously priced someone is selling something for. It is theirs and you can pay them what they ask or simply not buy it. Taking it is stealing, plain and simple.
I totally agree with you Compdata 100%
Guest said:To all of you who agree to the wave of bans going on. Screw you! If Microsoft was smart, instead of banning everybody, they could charge a higher rate for the live account of people using modded systems. Why not go that route. They can still make a lot of money that way and I'm positive peolple will complain but they will still pay to be able to play their games online.
I don't think sooooo.. they looking at the whole picture for that MASS market. they looking for numbers , not limiting them self to just few thousand users. They really don't care if they lose 1million users. Thats 1 million less hacked users they need to worried about.
JudaZ said:Microsoft does not say you cant mod you Xbox 360. Of course its your right to do so, you bought it , do what you want. you of course void warrenties, but that is clear to everyone. MS isnīt prosecuting anyone for modding their xbox...all they are saying is that we dont allow modded xbox 360īs to connect to Xbox live. We ban the machine from our system. You can continue to use your live account, you can continue to use your xbox 360. You just cant use an xbox you have modded on xbox live.
Its their right to do so. MS have rights as well. Would say their have acted gracefully, they could have acted like the movie and music industriy....but they dont.
Good 1......JudaZ
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