14 DAY TRIAL // Just in time to catch the Modern Warfare 2 launch, Microsoft decided to initialize its own war, that against pirated Xbox 360 consoles. The company issued a huge ban across Xbox Live on all modded rigs and an overwhelming amount of players were outraged by this decision. Discussions of a lawsuit even began to emerge, as at least one law firm decided to spearhead the attack against Microsoft. Reportedly, the number of banned consoles stretches from anything from 600,000 up to one million bans. If we're to judge from what was seen on Craigslist, that number might not be so far from the truth, but Microsoft denies these allegations.
According to Xbox Live General Manager Marc Whitten, this number is well beyond the real one. "We didn't release the number. I cannot explain to you why people would think it was a million people. It wasn't a million people," Whitten said while talking to VentureBeat. In the interview, he also stated that the whole banning XBL users thing was a "cat and mouse game," so it's a bit weird the company is insisting on proceeding with this. Still, if he really wanted to discard this rumor, he could have just issued an official number.
"These were people that were pirating software," Whitten added. "We try to keep sanctity of life from a safety and anti-cheating perspective and we protect our partners...I think we do a really good job understanding what people are doing on the system. That applies to intellectual property (piracy) and how we treat the community in terms of harassment. We are committed to making it better and better." The decision to support the developers is quite an admirable one, even if the company can count itself as one of these developers.
A lot of people out there purchase a brand-new Xbox 360 with the premeditated intention of modding their console in order to support pirated software. So, with all these bans, the company could discourage people from purchasing the console at all, since buying a 360 is a long-term investment if you can eliminate the cost of software purchase. There must be a money scheme from Microsoft here, even if we can't see it yet.