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Microsoft Talks Handhelds, Xbox Linux

Posted by simoniker on from the boxy-has-moxy dept.

Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing to a Canada.com interview with Xbox head honcho Robbie Bach, which shoots him some wide-ranging and perceptive questions about Microsoft's console strategy. Interesting answers include whether Microsoft wants to get into the handheld console market ("It's like starting a new business...we will focus on making the current Xbox successful."), and their views of Linux for Xbox ("..the numbers are not really that big. It's not a commercial as much as it is an intellectual property issue and we always pursue those.")

5 of 404 comments (clear)

  1. Cheat?!? by georgn · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Q. Folks have even built a Linux-Xbox computer. How can you control this?

    A. Electronic hobbyists will do what they want to do...the numbers are not really that big. It's not a commercial as much as it is an intellectual property issue and we always pursue those. If someone finds a way to cheat, we close it down and do an update so people can't anymore.

    I'd be very curious to know how running Linux on an Xbox is cheating.

    1. Re:Cheat?!? by Malcontent · · Score: 5, Insightful

      " Simply put, if you're running Linux on a machine that MS sells with their own OS, you're cheating them out of market share. "

      Aren't you also cheating them out of market share if you choose to buy a PS/2 or heaven forbid not buying a game console at all?

      When are people going to end up in jail for not buying MS products?

      --

      War is necrophilia.

  2. Unconstitutional........ by PS-SCUD · · Score: 5, Insightful

    From the article: Telling us what we can or can't create, we think is unconstitutional.

    But of course if MS tells YOU what you can or cannot create, that's perfectly OK.

    --


    "Much work is lost, for the lack of a little more." -Edward H. Harriman
  3. Re:XBOX IP by Kadin2048 · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I don't really see how they would have any grounds for prosecution here. I'm not a lawyer, but I don't think they can in any way dictate how you use the hardware that you buy from them. The hardware is just plastic--you bought it, it's yours. Play games on it, use it as a space heater, toilet seat, piece of modern art, whatever. Same with the media and boxes that the games come on.


    Where they could begin to get at you is if you ran Linux on an XBox, and then connected up to their online gaming system. If the system was designed to reject anything that wasn't running the MS XBox OS, and you spoofed it into thinking that your XBox-Linux was in fact the original OS, then you could be in trouble (because the TOS for the online service would undoubtedly prohibit you from connecting with a less-than-virgin box).


    But if all you were doing was just running Linux on your XBox, just for the pure hell of it and because you can, without connecting up to their servers, I think you're probably safe. At least, I don't see how this would possibly infringe on their IP. Seems to me like they're just trying to discourage people...toss around the threat of an IP lawsuit and watch any large-scale effort to distribute an alternate XBox OS disappear.

    --
    "Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
  4. Re:Handheld Possibilities by NortWind · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I'm curious as to how you consider going from 0% market share to 20% market share, beating out the formerly #2 player (Nintendo) to be "utterly beaten" in the console market?

    Compare either Nintendo's or Sony's profits to MS's loss of $300M (claimed by MS in the article for division) or loss of $1B (as claimed in PC World article). The other two companies made more than infinitely more than MS. That's a pretty good beat down.