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Netflix confirms it snatched Activision's CFO
It didn't take long for Netflix to confirm its bid to poach Activision's financial chief -- the streaming giant has announced that Spencer Neumann will join the company to replace outgoing CFO David Wells. The company didn't say when Neumann would officially take the reins, but earlier leaks had him stepping in sometime in early 2019. Activision, unsurprisingly, isn't happy.
Xbox COO sees dedicated handheld market as a 'red ocean,' will let Sony and Nintendo swim in it
Dennis Durkin is COO and CFO for Microsoft's Interactive Entertainment Business. He's also a dude thoroughly disillusioned with the future of portable consoles. Speaking to IndustryGamers, Durkin explains that the "crowded" nature of the mobile gaming market right now makes it extremely difficult to launch a dedicated handheld gaming device successfully -- in his colorful words, it's "a very, very red ocean." Whose blood is soiling those waters? The Nintendo 3DS, says Durkin, which has sold reasonably well, but has clearly failed to reach the lofty expectations set for it by fans and previous handhelds from the company. Likewise, the PS Vita invites a lot of skepticism from the Xbox chief, who says his excitement is reserved for what Microsoft can do with Kinect, Xbox Live and unique content. You might say it's to be expected that an Xbox exec would be casting doubt over Sony's great new hope, but what we learn in the process is that Microsoft has no intentions of squaring up to its home console nemesis on the mobile front. Not with dedicated hardware, anyway.
Microsoft exec caught in privacy snafu, says Kinect might tailor ads to you
Microsoft's Dennis Durkin voiced an interesting idea at an investment summit last week -- the idea that the company's Kinect camera might pass data to advertisers about the way you look, play and speak. "We can cater what content gets presented to you based on who you are," he told investors, suggesting that the Kinect offered business opportunities that weren't possible "in a controller-based world." And over time that will help us be more targeted about what content choices we present, what advertising we present, how we get better feedback. And data about how many people are in a room when an advertisement is shown, how many people are in a room when a game is being played, how are those people engaged with the game? How are they engaged with a sporting event? Are they standing up? Are they excited? Are they wearing Seahawks jerseys?Needless to say, sharing this level of photographic detail with advertisers presents some major privacy concerns -- though it's nothing we haven't heard before -- but moreover it's explicitly against the privacy policy Microsoft presents Kinect users. "Third party partners use aggregated data to deliver Kinect experiences (games or applications), to understand how customers use their Kinect experiences, and to improve performance or even to help plan new experiences," the Kinect Privacy and Online Safety FAQ reads, but also "They are not permitted to use the information for marketing purposes such as selling you games or services, or for personalizing advertising" (bolding ours). In an email to the Wall Street Journal, Microsoft flatly denied that the Kinect would do anything of the sort, whether via third-party partners or otherwise. "Xbox 360 and Xbox LIVE do not use any information captured by Kinect for advertising targeting purposes," representatives wrote. Honestly, some of us at Engadget still think targeted advertising is kind of neat, but we know how seriously you take this stuff.
Bloomberg estimates Xbox Live to be worth $1 billion+
Given the number of users and $50-a-year subscription fee, it's hardly a surprise that Microsoft is pulling in a ton of cash from Xbox Live, but it looks like the service has recently crossed a significant milestone: the $1 billion mark. That's what Bloomberg estimates for the past fiscal year, at least, based on the number of paid users (about 12.5 million), and a recent statement from Microsoft's Dennis Durkin, who said that sales of downloadable content had topped subscription revenue for the first time. That translates to about $600 million from subscription revenue, and at least $600 million from other sales, for a grand total somewhere north of $1.2 billion. Can't really blame Sony for following its lead, can you? Update: Credit where credit is due -- turns out Forbes also arrived at similar numbers back during E3. It "conservatively estimates" that Microsoft raked in $625 million selling downloadable content in the past year, resulting in more than $1.25 billion in total revenue.
Microsoft Xbox head honcho Shane Kim retires, declines to offer us a piece of cake
Microsoft VP Shane Kim has been anything but a stranger to these pages over the years: we first had a sit-down with the man way back in the halcyon days of early 2006, and as recently as this summer he was discussing the probable-possibility of Xbox games making their way onto mobile devices. Now, after nineteen years with the company and a career spanning the original Xbox through the present day (and Project Natal), our man has officially announced his retirement at the end of the year. Apparently his duties will be split between Dennis Durkin, who's been named chief operating officer of the company's video game unit, and Phil Spencer, who will oversee Microsoft Game Studios. Kim has yet to proclaim any post-Microsoft plans, saying he intends to relax and spend time with friends and family. Now that that's out of the way, Microsoft, when can we expect to see Live Anywhere up and running?
