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Microsoft may launch social networks on Xbox
By siliconindia
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Thursday, 15 October 2009, 15:08 IST
San Francisco: Microsoft is still not ready to allow the public in on the fun yet, and is only willing to bring Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm, instant streaming of movies and TV shows on its online service, Xbox Live in November this year.
In E3 press conference last June, Microsoft had announced to roll out these new features to the public in the fall. Well, it's now the fall, and on Wednesday, Daniel Terdiman and Josh Lowensohn, Staff Writers, C-net, got at the pre-release Xbox Live implementation of Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm,video streaming, and had a chance to talk to Xbox Live General Manager Ron Pessner about it all. Following the meeting, it has become clear that Microsoft is still not ready for launch. The company has announced to launch in November - with no actual date announced.
In his meeting with Terdiman and Lowensohn, Pessner told that Microsoft's interest is in getting the feature up and running and letting Xbox Live users begin to access the popular social network on their TVs sooner, rather than later, even though some fundamental elements of Facebook haven't been included. According to Pessner, a chief goal of the implementation was to make it easy for users to make photo slide shows and watch them on their TVs. A quick demo revealed that much of the Xbox Live Facebook tool is built around looking at photo albums, scrolling between friends' albums and seeing who on a user's friends list has added photos to their account.
But one of Facebook's most fundamental offerings is photos and allowing users to upload them, and Microsoft has chosen, for now at least, not to let users do that. Pessner says that the decision was made that Facebook on Xbox Live is about viewing images, and that anyone who wants to upload them to the social network will do so via the web. It's a fair point, but it does seem like a major omission, and it would seem like something Microsoft will have to address soon.
Like its Facebook counterpart, the interface of Xbox Live Twitter will look very familiar to Xbox Live users. Pessner said that the idea was to design a Twitter experience for the living room. That means, of course, a fairly scaled down Twitter application. Users can post their own tweets, view friends' tweets, re-tweet them, favorite them, look at profiles, @ reply to others, and do Twitter searches.
One thing missing from both the Facebook and Twitter applications, however, is the ability to click on URLs, something that is a major piece of the social-networking puzzle these days. Pessner said, "That's not something we support right now. Today we're focused on delivering a great Twitter and Facebook experience which connects the Xbox Live community to friends in new and unique ways. This is just the beginning, and the great thing about Xbox Live is that we can evolve and update features based on the community's feedback."
The third piece of the new Xbox Live puzzle is its Last.fm application. Last.fm (which is owned by CNET News parent CBS Interactive) is a music service aimed at helping users to discover new songs and artists; something Microsoft is hoping that it will add to users' overall Xbox Live experience. Pessner said that adding Last.fm gives users access to a wide range of new music and music-related tools, much as adding Netflix to Xbox Live last year did for movies.
The last new feature is the InstantOn streaming service that Xbox Live users will have access to. The idea is to give those buying or renting TV shows or movies through the Zune video marketplace (formerly known as the Xbox Live video marketplace) instant gratification instead of making them wait for their content to download.
The service will offer full 1080p high-definition movies and TV shows, and will let those who purchase content watch it right away or download it to their Xbox, a Zune player, or a PC. Those who rent content will be able to stream it and will have 24 hours to finish watching it once they press 'play'. From Microsoft's perspective, this new set of offerings will make the Xbox an even stronger entertainment option than it has been in the past. But Pessner said that there is still much more that can be added to the platform.
