Aaron Greenberg’s Proud of Xbox Live

Aaron Greenberg was recently interviewed by the nice people at GameDaily, and while Aaron craftily avoided to give away any details about Microsoft’s plans for the Xbox, he was able to say a few juicy bits we could speculate from.

He’s a marketing manager for Pete’s sake, he wouldn’t get to that position if he didn’t know how to watch his mouth. When it comes to marketing teams, it’s safe to assume that anything they say or have said involved much forethought. There’s a console war a-brewin’; it’s their job to create buzz.

First off, he didn’t really say anything we don’t already know about the Xbox 360. He did give us some nice figures on how well Xbox Live is doing. According to Greenberg, there have been around a whopping 50 million downloads from Xbox Live Marketplace to date, an average of 1.3 million voice and text messages sent every day on the Xbox 360. When asked if the company is considering putting in advertising into Xbox Live to help pay for more free content, he just basically dodged the question. The figures are comforting though so we can be assured that Microsoft will continue with their online push.

He also used the moment to take a shot at the PS3 by saying, “It doesn’t take a Blu-ray disc to deliver stunning high definition graphics and huge, immersive worlds to explore.” Greenberg goes on by saying that they’re working on improving compression technology so that excess content wouldn’t require excess disc space. He also says that while the discs will be important, distribution is also a big factor. That’s something that Sony is currently having troubles with because of a shortage of blue laser diodes needed for the Blu-ray.

For movie-inclined Xbox 360 owners, he assured us that the HD-DVD player will be out in time for the holidays and that it will stay “affordable.”

Other things he was dodgy about was specifics on the new Xbox Live Dashboard, Halo 3, and the company’s plans for Live Anywhere. At least we already know that they’re looking to the gamers for input on the dashboard update.

I think I know why he’s so hush hush. For one thing, the holiday season’s almost here, and they’re opting to say what they have to say on the proper stage. He said, “We’ll have some great news at Tokyo Game Show next week and I think you will be really surprised by what we have planned at X06.” We’re hoping it’ll be something on Halo 3, but you can never really tell with these marketing people. Anyway, we’ll keep an eye out for more news, and if anything new comes out, we’ll keep you updated.

Aaron Greenberg was recently interviewed by the nice people at GameDaily, and while Aaron craftily avoided to give away any details about Microsoft’s plans for the Xbox, he was able to say a few juicy bits we could speculate from.

He’s a marketing manager for Pete’s sake, he wouldn’t get to that position if he didn’t know how to watch his mouth. When it comes to marketing teams, it’s safe to assume that anything they say or have said involved much forethought. There’s a console war a-brewin’; it’s their job to create buzz.

First off, he didn’t really say anything we don’t already know about the Xbox 360. He did give us some nice figures on how well Xbox Live is doing. According to Greenberg, there have been around a whopping 50 million downloads from Xbox Live Marketplace to date, an average of 1.3 million voice and text messages sent every day on the Xbox 360. When asked if the company is considering putting in advertising into Xbox Live to help pay for more free content, he just basically dodged the question. The figures are comforting though so we can be assured that Microsoft will continue with their online push.

He also used the moment to take a shot at the PS3 by saying, “It doesn’t take a Blu-ray disc to deliver stunning high definition graphics and huge, immersive worlds to explore.” Greenberg goes on by saying that they’re working on improving compression technology so that excess content wouldn’t require excess disc space. He also says that while the discs will be important, distribution is also a big factor. That’s something that Sony is currently having troubles with because of a shortage of blue laser diodes needed for the Blu-ray.

For movie-inclined Xbox 360 owners, he assured us that the HD-DVD player will be out in time for the holidays and that it will stay “affordable.”

Other things he was dodgy about was specifics on the new Xbox Live Dashboard, Halo 3, and the company’s plans for Live Anywhere. At least we already know that they’re looking to the gamers for input on the dashboard update.

I think I know why he’s so hush hush. For one thing, the holiday season’s almost here, and they’re opting to say what they have to say on the proper stage. He said, “We’ll have some great news at Tokyo Game Show next week and I think you will be really surprised by what we have planned at X06.” We’re hoping it’ll be something on Halo 3, but you can never really tell with these marketing people. Anyway, we’ll keep an eye out for more news, and if anything new comes out, we’ll keep you updated.