Online services are some of the most important attributes for the current generation of consoles as every gamer wants to connect with friends and family and play titles together. Whether it is Xbox Live, PlayStation Home or the Wii Channel, there is certainly something for everyone.

But while they keep evolving, some of their characteristics resemble more and more with others. With the introduction of a shared virtual movie theater for Xbox Live Avatars, gaming press members began to draw lines between Microsoft's service and the PlayStation Home solution from Sony, where people can interact and watch different videos together.

Not so, says Microsoft's Shane Kim, who talked with Kotaku on the matter of Live slowly becoming a Home lookalike. He went on to say that the service was more like an MMO, as it is an online space where people could interact with each other.

“I think that Live is an MMO, but that doesn't mean you have to create a virtual world. I think that's the big difference between our approach and Sony's approach. An MMO is a living, breathing, dynamic thing where you can find people online and entertainment you can connect with. I think that metaphor applies to the platform. That's the way we think about it when we try to program new content and experiences into it. Who knows, maybe someday personalizing a space might be part of it, but that's not the same as creating a virtual a world that's the main way you interact with other people.”

Even though Kim is trying to differentiate Live from Home, his own statements and description of what Live is trying to be is very similar to Sony's own service. Whether or not we will be seeing more and more things from Home adapted and implemented in Live is still unknown, but one thing's for sure, Home is definitely a trendsetter in terms of online services.