Slashdot Mirror
Viacom Buys Xfire For $102 Million
The New York Times is reporting that communications company Viacom has purchased the Xfire gaming network for $102 Million. From the article: "Judy McGrath, the chief executive of MTV Networks, which will oversee Xfire, said it would stay focused on building a community for game players, but its technology might be adapted for broader network services. Xfire has attracted four million users since it was introduced in 2004. Of those, one million are active and spend 91 hours each month using the service. The company sells advertising on its software and Web site, both to video game makers and to mass market marketers, including Dodge, Pepsi and Unilever."
What's to stop a company, or a bunch of disenfranchised users, creating a free alternative to XFire? I'm not familiar with the technology used, but it is a tracker that determines what game you are playing, when, isn't it? In that case, if Viacom choose to go with embedded ads/possible spyware and adware, then it would be almost trivial with a large community movement to create a "Y-Fire" without the ads, wouldn't it? So any revenue attempts by Viacom would lose them money. Bad move IMHO.
"Sure there's porn and piracy on the Web but there's probably a downside too."
Its an advertizers dream. You get a system that narrows down a specific group of interested gamers, and it tracks what games people are playing, so you know what games people play, how much the play, and once you data mine that, you can target ads, based on what other gamers who are playing the same games.
i would say for an established user base, and a decent technology, and a fat cheque for Thresh thats a good deal imo.