14 DAY TRIAL // The New York Times is reporting that Microsoft and the Walt Disney Company are in intense negotiations related to bringing ESPN channel content onto Xbox Live, the cable-like service Microsoft is offering to those who own an Xbox 360 and have an Internet connection.
The newspaper cites sources close to the discussions between the two parties that do not want to be named because of the overall sensitivity of the issue on the table.
ESPN is already offering a wide variety of content to some PC users who have broadband connections. The same kind of content could be delivered on Xbox Live. Having about 2.2 million users registered online at the same time in December 2009, the audience of the Microsoft service compares favorably with that of a specialized cable channel.
The Walt Disney Company is probably interested in evaluating the potential Xbox Live has as far as generating revenue from ads goes, while the software giant might be keen on getting at least some content for the Xbox 360 not available to those who are connected via a PC. As gaming consoles become multimedia centers and actually compete with the various television channels for the leisure time of players, we might see more television content moving to the Xbox 360, the PlayStation 3 and even the Nintendo Wii. Microsoft is saying that about 39 million Xbox 360 home gaming consoles have been sold all over the world and that a little more than half of users have connected their devices to Xbox Live, although it's not clear what the proportion of Silver to Gold ones is.
Last year, Microsoft went to great lengths to offer new non-gaming content to the service, introducing Facebook and Twitter access and allowing its customers to listen to music on last.fm. The company also introduced the trivia game show 1 vs. 100 and more functionality to the Netflix service.