December 5th 2011 6:00 am PT

A Letter from Marc Whitten: A New Xbox 360 Experience

The following is a letter from CVP of Xbox LIVE Marc Whitten that he wanted me to share directly with the Xbox LIVE community.

Dear Xbox LIVE Members,

Today, we’re launching a new Xbox 360 experience that connects you with your favorite entertainment and games like never before and makes finding and enjoying entertainment as simple as it should be.

It’s a vision we shared at E3 and I’d like to thank you for all of your valuable feedback along this incredible ride and share a little more about what we have in store this holiday – from Beacons, cloud storage and Facebook sharing, to our latest entertainment offerings.

Building upon our great lineup of partners, we’ve teamed up with nearly 40 of the world’s leading TV & entertainment providers to bring you an array of live and on-demand TV, movies, games, sports and music experiences. The first wave of new partners rolls out today with experiences like EPIX and TODAY (MSNBC) in the US, LOVEFiLM in the UK, Sky Go in Germany, Premium Play by (MediaSet) in Italy and Telefonica España – Movistar Imagenio in Spain. And we’ll continue to roll out more entertainment content to Xbox LIVE in the coming months.

Beyond entertainment, you’ll find a number of features designed to make your Xbox experience more personal, social and effortless. The dashboard has an entirely new look and feel and a completely reimagined interface that makes your entertainment accessible through simple voice commands. Now, using voice search with Bing on Xbox, you can find and play the programming you want across multiple entertainment providers without having to search for a remote control. In the mood for ‘The Office?’ Just say “Xbox, Bing, ‘The Office,’” and Xbox will display all episodes available from various entertainment apps across the console.

We’re also bringing you Beacons and Facebook sharing, further integrating social into your Xbox experience. Before jumping into an episode of ‘The Office,’ you can activate a Beacon to let your friends know that you want to play, say, “Gears of War 3.” Then, sit back and relax with the Dunder Mifflin crew. The Beacon will let you know when a LIVE friend is available for a round of Horde in Gears. After the game, use Facebook Sharing to tout your achievements and showcase your in-game accomplishments through direct posts.

While we’re proud of our capability to connect you remotely to the global community of more than 35 million Xbox LIVE members, sometimes there’s nothing like being with your friends and family. And so we’ve added cloud storage so you can access game saves and your LIVE profile, including achievements, from your friends’ consoles as well.

Lastly, with the ever-expanding library of content available, we realize Xbox is enjoyed by all members of the family. Rest assured that our parental controls have improved in parallel with this new content. Parents can manage their child’s console activity, sharing on social networking sites as well as regulate access to games, movies, television, and music. Additionally, the update brings enhanced navigation to Xbox 360 Family Settings to better integrate with Kinect.

We strive to continually innovate and bring meaningful experiences to each and every member of the Xbox LIVE community. Currently, our community is already enjoying 2.1 billion hours of entertainment each month. We imagine this number will only continue to grow as you discover enhanced entertainment on Xbox this holiday that is instantly searchable, easily discoverable and enjoyable in extraordinary new ways. We hope you enjoy this new chapter in the evolution of Xbox and continue to push us to write the next.

See you on LIVE,

Marc Whitten

Gamertag – Notwen

Xbox 360, Xbox Live By Larry Hryb, Xbox LIVE's Major Nelson

permalink: http://majornelson.com/2011/12/05/a-letter-from-marc-whitten-a-new-xbox-360-experience/

Anonymous

where is the picture viewer?? not a big deal to most of yas but we actually use ours for partys and baby pictures!!
Anonymous

I’m also not a fan of this new design. It’s too cluttered and messy. It’s designed to be easier to use with Kinect, but not with a controller. You’ve made certain functions more complicated now for no reason. (And when I say you…I don’t mean Major Nelson, I mean MS). I liked the last “NXE” dashboard, I always liked it over the original “blades” dashboard. But this new dashboard is very disappointing.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_UNMQ7FSEMXKO4ZOB2PKWCURFKE John Giles

And another complaint! My XBox 360 titles that I’ve downloaded can’t be sorted separately? If there’s a way other than cycling through my 200+ titles to get to a specific letter of the game I want, please tell me.
I HATE THIS UPDATE WITH ALL MY HEART!!!!!
Anonymous

bad design for a controller, great if i had a kinect . Kinect won’t WORK FOR ME ! I have only 2 feet of space in front of my TV. And I will not pay 100 bucks just to get voice navigation. So I have to say thanks but no thanks. Also a lot of things have just really been made more difficult. Where are my games I downloaded and haven’t played in a while? Do i really have to wade through all my files alphabetically?
http://twitter.com/PsyKoMunKy PsyKo MunKy

My main Xbox still hasn’t updated – the rarely used one in my bedroom updated a day ago… what’s the deal?
http://www.facebook.com/people/Stephen-Underwood/100001281346724 Stephen Underwood

new dashboard BOOOOOO If it is not broke do NOT fix it I have had an Xbox since day one and this by far is the worst yet. What did you hire Facebook to do your updating?
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1198448516 Kelly Beyer

Wow, I’m shocked at how amazingly thoroughly you’ve ruined Netflix on the 360. Well done!!!
http://www.facebook.com/bamology David Omega Bell

what the hell in new zealand you cant stream music from your pc or let alone play any music but you can stream movies whats going on why is this happening
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=762492719 Anthony Kei Muscaro

Now I can use my kinect to easily get to my games that all only play with a controller, alright!! Wait, no, that’s a terrible idea. I do wonder if Netflix will be thrilled to see that they lose customers due to this ruined mess as I only stream from Xbox and looking at it now, I won’t be using it anymore either.
Laurence Weir

I am tired of MS gimping my console because I don’t like playing online with other people. I understand it’s legitimate to charge to get a good online experience, considering the load top games put on servers. However, my next console purchase will not be a MS because it seems they want to screw me out of £30 a year to make my console act like a media player….something I can get my computer to do for free.

Please can we have multimedia functionality for free. This only makes your console a better purchase, and will not get you a fraction less Gold subscriptions!
http://twitter.com/GiftedGimp Andy

Isnt it good that all the people complaining about the new dashboard have given themselves time to learn how to navigate and use it…
OH wait, They Haven’t.

Back when NXE dash was released everyone reacted the same way screaming bring back the blades, why fix whats not broken, etc,etc.
But in time people got used to the NXE Dash and the complaining ceased.

I’ve been part of the preview program and have to admit for the first couple of days it was a pain, navigating and finding what I wanted, but then as I got more used to the Metro Dash I was able to find things with ease and now really enjoy the new system.

Those who remeber the Blade Dash, the new Metro is very similar in the way it operates, instead of blades you now have Hubs, navigation between the hubs is quickly done via the L/R bumper buttons and instead of being presented with a list as you was on the old Blade system you now have windows which contain the content.

There are are 6 TRUE small Advertisment windows, the big windows are more for information, for example in the TV Hub the big window shows whats on your Default TV provider, in games the Big window shows what DLC is available. They are not true advertisments as they are just informing you of whats available on the Live network.

The Metro Dash isn’t perfect, then again NXE and the Blades Dash wasn’t, but in Spring/Summer and then next winter there will most likley be more dashboard updates which will tweak how the Metro Dash operates.

At the end of the day if you REALLY HATE the dash the solution is simple, set you xbox to auto play discs in the setting, that way you can use the trusty guide button to access parties and beacons etc and you dont have to bother with the Metro Dash at all.
- http://twitter.com/NathanielFrost1 Nathaniel Frost
  
  You’re entitled to your opinion, as is everyone else. I’m in the preview too, and most of the gripes I have, and have seen voiced in public forums are similar. Little tweaks to the dash, like which button ejects the disk, changes to the Netflix app that seem to downgrade its functions, and the prominence of ads are issues MS should listen to the community about.
  I think you’re right; maybe later on they’ll will make more improvements, and in time it may even be revered. Right now, though, it does need work.
- Anonymous
  
  “Back when NXE dash was released everyone reacted the same way screaming
  bring back the blades, why fix whats not broken, etc,etc.
  But in time people got used to the NXE Dash and the complaining ceased.”
  
  Actually when the NXE came out I like it better than the “blades” dash immediately. So yeah…probably shouldn’t be making assumptions.
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_UNMQ7FSEMXKO4ZOB2PKWCURFKE John Giles
  
  For my GAMING system, I do not want, nor do I need to learn a new method of getting my content constantly, and if I have to “get used to it” then there’s something that is counterintuitive and flat out wrong with the layout.
  This layout is just flat out awful. Whoever thought of it certainly did not have gaming in mind. This new layout is beyond confusing. I now have to take extra steps in order to just get to my arcade games, and it only shows five at a time? I’ve got over 200 titles. This is a pain. The old system worked and wasn’t nearly as confusing.
  The last thing you ever want to hear someone say is “once you get used to it….” when this is said, it means that navigation is now work and requires too much investigation. I want to go where I want, without having to wade through constant menu options and 50,000 advertisements.
  Bottom line is that this new layout is garbage, it’s confusing, and it’s counterintuitive. If they were smart, they’d come out and say “Sorry, we were wrong! we’ll streamline the old one with some new options, but give your control back.”.
http://www.facebook.com/j.a.w.s.85 J Triple Dash

I thought the new dash was supposed to save time and be less restrictive? I’m having to spend more time in the menus because of the poor layout and why when I go to games/demos/dlc/videos etc it lists them from top rated then I have to change it to release date to see whats new THEN if I back out then go back in its back to top rated? If I change a setting it should stay changed!! this new menu is not going to help xbla sales because its near impossible to find new content. and why is there 3 other peoples avatars next to mine in the menu? if I want to see my friends then I will go to my friends list. its all a mess
http://www.facebook.com/j.a.w.s.85 J Triple Dash

I thought the new dash was supposed to save time and be less restrictive? I’m having to spend more time in the menus because of the poor layout and why when I go to games/demos/dlc/videos etc it lists them from top rated then I have to change it to release date to see whats new THEN if I back out then go back in its back to top rated? If I change a setting it should stay changed!! this new menu is not going to help xbla sales because its near impossible to find new content. and why is there 3 other peoples avatars next to mine in the menu? if I want to see my friends then I will go to my friends list. its all a mess
buried_horizon

So when will that youtube get released? Tuesday I assume? Since the UFC one is set for dec 20…
http://twitter.com/BGCurator Randy Brown

Why on Earth was the party feature for Netflix removed? Was it the same reason 1 vs 100 was killed? (people liked it)
http://twitter.com/cityhunter_sega City Hunter

This dashboard is the worst of all.
It’s confusing, full of advertisement (even offline), the main function are ina a tiny corner (are you serioes?) the navigation in game library is a joke, you cannot see the full games ect.

Browsing the achievements is less enjoyable than before, the themes are all ruined by the darker gray, avatars are too small compared to before, and on SDTV, the text is too tiny.

I don’t know who thought that wasting 70% of screen space was a good idea…

Now even the PS3 dashboard is better than this.
Please fix this mess of dashboard.
http://www.ghzsports.com GHz Charles

This new dashboard is going to take some getting used to, especially if you use a standard controller. If you’re heavy on using Kinect and/or voice commands, you’ll probably love it.
http://twitter.com/senstivz SENSTiVz

NEW UPDATE=NEW PROBLEMS
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000493104910 Luis Cristo

i will not spend even 1 cent with xbox 360 account’s or other related products, until in portugal the situation with this product is resolved.
If we pay the same as in other countrys why in portugal we don’t HAVE ABSOLUTE NOTHING, no kinect support, no youtube, no radio, no NOTHING.

IM TIRED OF THIS SH**
Joao Ferreira

The Portuguese Xbox community is outraged by the lack of content they receive in comparison to US or Uk accounts and on top of that we pay 59€ for 12 months about 15 € more than Uk accounts. Xbox Portugal have the most unprofessional and incompetent personnel I have ever seen they don´t even know what their main audience is (Offering on Facebook tickets to twilight for example), publicity is non existent, game prices are as high as 70€, stores despise the brand leaving Xbox products with minimum visibility ( Playstation 3 has enormous space as well as Nintendo and only a small number of shelves for Microsoft with only 6 or 7 xbox games at ridiculous prices like Timeshift for 59,99 € a game that is already out for 3 or 4 years), dashboard in Brazilian instead of English which is preferred for many Portuguese users and other examples which I cant remember at this moment. The ridiculously low number in sales is fully credited by the work that the small community has been doing all these years, but we are rowing tired of doing the work of your incompetent Portuguese collaborators, some of our community members have said that in the next generation they will be forced to buy Sony. I am really desapointed by the low number of Hardcore games being presented in the current catalog of Microsoft as well, HARCORE GAMERS DON´T LIKE KINECT get over it.
HARDCORE GAMERS have been your custumers since the beginning, and this E3 was laughable the worst conference in E3 history.
Microsoft deal with the Portuguese incompetent team and drop the excessive kinect support.
http://www.facebook.com/Marabyte Hugo Marabutt Nogueira

I can understand why some countries lack some features, there may be some licencing issues and other legal issues. What I don’t understand why the price is the same in all countries if the service isn’t the same.

If a given country cant have Music, Video, TV, Youtube, Daillymotion, SOFTWARE IN THE NATIVE LANGUAGE, HBO, ESPN, Zune Marketplace, etc etc.. why do you charge the same amount as if they could have??
Anonymous

Good job ms. I dont know why everyone is complaining so much before they even give it a chance. I think it is much more user friendly. The only complaint is why do you commercialize on the dashboard so much. We all realize that you guys want money but its getting a little overboard on the billboards. More content and less commercials. After a while of too much advertising on the dashboard SMART people will have enough. Too much of a bad thing isnt ever good.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Joao-Lopes/100000496547888 Joao Lopes

i live in portugal ,and i´m very dissapionted,with the live service in my country.
no movies,no tv series,no youtube,no nothing.
i pay 60 euros only for play online,a few demos, a few game videos and thats it.
i think i will stop my gold service next year,and sell my xbox and buy a ps3.
at least in portugal you dont hve much services in ps network ,but at least its free.
to pay 60 euros per year to play online,it sucks!
i think you major nelson or someone should check the xbox live service in portugal ,and try to make it worth to be be a xbox live user in portugal.
i´m very sad about it.
if xbox live doesn´t change in portugal next year or if microsoft ,doesn´t do anything ,i will sell my xbox ,quit xbox live gold service ,and buy a ps3 ,at least its free,and have a few more features.
merry christmas.
ps: i´m very seriuos about it ,you should do something about xbox live in my country.
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Ismael-Khan/100001779326267 Ismael Khan
  
  add me on xbox live i will give you 20 apps
Anonymous

Please, please, please make these dash updates optional! All I want is to go back to the very first NXE, this new one is a mess in my opinion and I wish I could undo it.

I’m sure other people love the new dash, that’s fine each to their own, enjoy it. Just give me a choice on whether to update without cutting of my online play.

Please?
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000156601305 Ricardo Matias

Microsoft International should be ashamed! Our Live in Portugal is ridiculous compared to other countries! Not going to pay any more cent to renew my Gold next year to others get services that we will never have! Management of the Xbox products in Portugal GTFO! NOW! BE ASHAMED!
http://www.facebook.com/people/Ricardo-Correia/659145357 Ricardo Correia

I like the dash, but I won’t pay 60€ again and get half or not even that of what people get for less money in other countries. And yes I live in Portugal, and yes Xbox Portugal should get a staff revision…
http://www.facebook.com/saiboxer António Pereira

Please, lost a little time reading this … I know it’s a little long, but it’s important for a lot of people of your community – that’s what Xbox Players should be.

The new Dashboard is great, but … I just need to ask: Why you (Xbox) accepted my inscription on the Preview if I cannot participate on it? I just have a blank channel in my console … and it seems is until the next year.

Why? Because I have a Portuguese account. I pay more for the Live than the other players of other countries, for less content.
I know that the other people in year will be tired of all this comments about Portuguese lack of content, but please, you should understand our position: we all are part of the same community. Imagine that you don’t have Indie Games, 99% of the new Apps that will be included soon, 100% of the content you already had, etc.I really can understand the absence of the Dashboard in Portuguese from Portugal (the real Portuguese, not the Brazilian) since Brazilian people are more than 190X more than us, but what I can’t really get is why we don’t have the same, or at least, a lot more content like the other players who like us pay for the Live Account (less actually), for the games (less again), and accessories (imagine … less).here in Portugal PlayStation is King, and Nintendo is growing a lot since it is represented by Nintendo itself … but Xbox seems to give up of our market. No pub, no content, no promotion events, nothing … and now, even us, the players are being putted aside (well, this is not completely true since we have less content since ever).Thanks for your attention.
Anonymous

Hate Metro interface!!! Achievement Unlocked: Angry Gamer. Achievement Unlocked: Gold Account Cancelled. Achievement Unlocked: Skipping Windows 8.
http://twitter.com/Darkwatch1137 Darkwatch1137

Fix the Themes interface to the previews one cuz my premium themes wont display as it was desinged and i can’t see the backgrond pictures that are behind the avatars of my friends and, I PAY FOR THAT!!!!
Anonymous

For the love of god put the games tab before the blooy tv and film one its a games console!!!!! Its a stupid layout.
Anonymous

Well with the new dash I can no longer find a way to start Kinect fun labs.
Nick Campbell

The update has broken the ability to stream WAV music from PC to Xbox 360. All I now hear is white noise. Surely this wasn’t meant to happen. I have no idea where to report these problems
http://twitter.com/_jintz John

This update has broken the ability for me to sign into my Xbox. This has been broken since at least last Wednesday.
“Sorry, XBOX LIVE can’t downloading profiles right now. Try again later.”
Error code 80151103

Always the same error, HELP!
http://www.facebook.com/people/Noah-Throop/1030695690 Noah Throop

The new dash is good but will youtube come to xbox soon plz tell me.
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Ismael-Khan/100001779326267 Ismael Khan
  
  only in 24counties wher do u live?
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_UNMQ7FSEMXKO4ZOB2PKWCURFKE John Giles

I think they should offer achievements for the new interface! 50GS for figuring out how to get to (instert pretty much anything here). I figure they could offer 1000GS like a disc based game, and then with every modification to it, offer 250 more with new features.

In other words…. THIS UPDATE SUCKS.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1538659801 Jason Butcher

I have made some very valid points in the king of fighters blog post that major nelson uploaded a couple days ago. if you agree please comment!!!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1538659801 Jason Butcher

my comments are under- J triple dash.
http://www.facebook.com/inc420oz Casey Wheeler

What a joke Netflix is officially the worst on any device, used to like it more then my Roku player, but now that you start show’s automatically and it’s slower then dial up, that should be removed. I like the interface, but auto starting show’s and the slowness is just annoying. Also the advertisements are a slap in the face to your users, every tab has one, when I use bing i get some, Gold members pay 60 bucks a year or more to play online, and with game companies charging 10 bucks now. Your gold deal of the week was never enough to justify 60 bucks vs. free on the PS3, deal of the week is a stretch. I might get lucky and you’ll discount something that’s been out for a year and i haven’t already gotten it. so deal of the year is more accurate, now you’ve got ads littering the dashboard and search results. All you did was give us a new interface, and screw up the Netflix app. Other then that 6 years as a gold member plus hundreds of dollars in add ons and games, will be gone when the PS4 beats your 720 or 360 2 or Xbox 3! Whatever you call it, the PSN is becoming just as good and in some ways better then Xbox live, you better come up with something better then Kinect and an old discounted game once a week to keep people with you. THROW US A FEW MORE ADS AND MESS UP THE APPS EVEN MORE, AND SEE WHERE YOUR LOYAL FANS GO WHEN THE NEW CONSOLES COME OUT.
http://www.facebook.com/inc420oz Casey Wheeler

What a joke Netflix is officially the worst on any device, used to like it more then my Roku player, but now that you start show’s automatically and it’s slower then dial up, that should be removed. I like the interface, but auto starting show’s and the slowness is just annoying. Also the advertisements are a slap in the face to your users, every tab has one, when I use bing i get some, Gold members pay 60 bucks a year or more to play online, and with game companies charging 10 bucks now. Your gold deal of the week was never enough to justify 60 bucks vs. free on the PS3, deal of the week is a stretch. I might get lucky and you’ll discount something that’s been out for a year and i haven’t already gotten it. so deal of the year is more accurate, now you’ve got ads littering the dashboard and search results. All you did was give us a new interface, and screw up the Netflix app. Other then that 6 years as a gold member plus hundreds of dollars in add ons and games, will be gone when the PS4 beats your 720 or 360 2 or Xbox 3! Whatever you call it, the PSN is becoming just as good and in some ways better then Xbox live, you better come up with something better then Kinect and an old discounted game once a week to keep people with you. THROW US A FEW MORE ADS AND MESS UP THE APPS EVEN MORE, AND SEE WHERE YOUR LOYAL FANS GO WHEN THE NEW CONSOLES COME OUT.
http://twitter.com/noclue_27 L L

Cool, but when will we be able to do simple things like pause a DVD with kinect voice control?…. >.<
Henrik Engblom

Please let people outside US and some other places use Voice commands! I have tried it on a US account and worked great with my Swedish accent! But Microsoft won’t let me use it on my own account because I live in Sweden! And please don’t do a Swedish version, I want to speak English not some awkward Swedish. Don’t even know most tech words in my own language because nothing tech I have uses Swedish.

December 5th 2011 6:00 am PT

A Letter from Marc Whitten: A New Xbox 360 Experience

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