Rumor: Microsoft Considering An Xbox Live TV Channel

By Ian, on May 6th, 2010

Rumors have been circulating in the gaming industry that an Xbox Live TV channel could be coming to the Xbox 360 dashboard. The rumors were at the peak when news slipped that Microsoft was talking to Conan O’Brien about doing a show on the new TV channel. A few days later a confirmation came that Conan was instead going to TBS to host a late night show.

This of course raised a lot of questions about the overall rumor of the TV channel. Former News Corp. President Peter Chernin and Microsoft apparently held secret meetings last month at Microsoft’s HQ in Redmond, Washington.

According to the rumors, Xbox Live Gold members would likely see their monthly fee rise by as much as $2.00 to cover the costs of the TV Channel. While most gamers consider the Xbox Live Gold membership worthy of its monthly cost, I am sure many will balk at the idea of paying more. The current price is $50.00 a year, but many great deals can be found like this one that was released today at Newegg at $34.99.

The purpose of the extra price hike means that Microsoft could also seek development of original shows to target the young male audience which dominates the online service says Xboxic.

I think this could be a compelling new service if Xbox Live brings social integration into the TV channel. Xbox Live has had great success with 1 vs 100 which is a TV like game show, but in the form of the free advertised based video game. The service has a set schedule of programs and is even hosted live by game show host. The last time I personally played the game over 90,000 people were playing the same time and interacting with each other answering the same questions and thru the live game show host.

Please leave your comments below and let us know if you think if this would be a good move for Xbox Live.

This post first appeared on WindowsObserver.com. If you enjoyed it please make sure you subscribe to the RSS feed and join our Facebook Fan Page to stay up to date.