Xbox 360 Dashboard update unifies Microsoft’s entertainment businesses, but challenges remain

The latest update fo the Xbox 360 dashboard is slowly releasing in different territories starting this week, brining new features like Internet Explorer to the platform. Microsoft still has changes to make before it perfects its digital entertainment ecosystem.

Microsoft is brewing up a fairly quiet storm for its Xbox 360 business this year. This week brought many announcements and new releases for the company’s console, identifying it even more with entertainment of all stripes rather than just video games. There was an Xbox 360 price drop to $250, Xbox Music opened for business, and now comes the new Xbox Dashboard update, a release that finally brings Internet Explorer to the seven-year-old machine.

Larry “Major Nelson” Hryb, the director of Xbox Live, announced via his blog that Microsoft is releasing its latest update for the Xbox 360’s proprietary interface starting Tuesday. Roll out is a more appropriate term than release, though, as not all regions will be able to download the update immediately, and it may take until November for it to be available in all regions.

“To ensure a stable release, this will be a gradual deployment across subscribers and regions over the course of the next week,” reads Hryb’s post, “Our initial deployment will reach approximately three million consoles worldwide, with additional users being updated over the course of a couple weeks. Don’t panic if you don’t see an immediate update, just keep checking back in.”

In addition to Internet Explorer, there are a number of other changes coming to the Dashboard, including improved search tools, the ability to customize your Dashboard front page by “pinning” your most used apps and services to the front, and the rebranding of the Zune Video Marketplace as Xbox Video.

Xbox SmartGlass support isn’t officially a part of this update. That won’t be released until Windows 8 hits on Oct. 26.

None of these changes are system sellers. Microsoft isn’t going to get people lining up on Black Friday because its downloadable video store has a new name and there’s a web browser on its gaming console. This Dashboard update will, however, make Microsoft’s myriad services a more uniform and understandable across its platforms. This update will bring the console ecosystem in line with where the Xbox brand is on phones, PCs, and tablets.

Microsoft will have to work hard not to frustrate consumers though. Internet Explorer is a potent tool for the Xbox 360, not for basic web services, but for its potential access to video entertainment. Microsoft will obviously block users from accessing video websites like Hulu, though, forcing them to pay for an Xbox Live Gold subscription so they can use Xbox-based apps. This Dashboard update, and its place in the larger Microsoft entertainment business, is only a half step. The company needs to drop Xbox Live Gold next, and make these web services free across its platforms, or it won’t be able to compete properly with Apple.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Microsoft leaks Xbox Music Pass pricing model, and no surprises here, it looks exactly like Zune Music Pass

Many Xbox Music features will be ported from Zune Music, and based on the Xbox dashboard update for beta testers, the same applies to the cost of the service.

No surprise here: Microsoft’s leaked Xbox Music service pricing model is no different from every subscription music service out there. Unlimited streaming music on Xbox will cost £8.99 (about $14.50) per month, or you could elect for a slightly discounted upfront cost of £89.90 ($145.15) per year.

With the intention of letting select Xbox owners try out the new Windows 8 interface, Microsoft accidentally leaked the pricing model with the dashboard update, according to The Verge. From what could be determined based on photos taken of the interface, users will be offered a 14-day free trial (Spotify offers 30 days of its premium service for free, for the record) and it also looks like Microsoft will offer a free, ad-supported version of its music service. But in order to use Xbox Music on your console at all, beta testers are reporting that you’ll be required to own a subscription to Xbox LIVE Gold.

The pricing model is similar to Microsoft’s existing Zune Music Pass service, which currently charges $9.99 per month or $100 per year, and it’s likely that the U.S. subscription cost to Xbox Music will be structured similarly. Like Spotify, it could be a possibility for the service to offer additional tiered pricing models based on the amount of access that you’d like.

Microsoft is clearly looking to compete in the music streaming market, with Xbox Music replacing the Zune brand that’s soon to be canned. Xbox Music is essentially a big rebranding effort of an existing service that Microsoft hopes will reenergize its foray into music, a sector that the company has been falling behind compared to its competitors.

From what we know so far, our expectation is that many of the Zune Music Pass features will be ported to Xbox Music. Users will be able to access Xbox Music across multiple devices, including the Xbox, desktop PCs, smartphones, and tablets that are running the Windows 8 operating system, and the service even includes Zune Music’s “Smart DJ” function, which plays a mix of similar music based on the songs in your collection. It also appears that the ability to sync your playlists with other devices will make its way from Zune Music to Xbox Music.

Although the music streaming industry is crowded enough as is with just about every major tech company — Sony, Samsung, and Google all have streaming products, and you can’t discount popular services like Pandora, Rdio, Last.fm and Spotify. And it should be noted that none of these services have yet to debut a Windows 8 specific app, making Xbox Music the de facto music streaming service for Windows device owners once its launched. 

The launch date of Xbox Music has yet to be announced by Microsoft.

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com

Kred evolves into Kred Story, a dashboard for digestible social analytics

Kred has shed its complicated analytics dashboard and launched Kred Story, an easy to navigate social influence analytics dashboard.

Behind every influencer is a story waiting to be shared, and Kred believes that its users are more than just a number. Kred, the influence measurement service, has redesigned itself as Kred Story, a comprehensive and easy-to-use analytics dashboard that displays its users’ social media activity.

It can often be difficult to make sense of charts, graphs, and numbers that may not necessarily mean anything to you. With this in mind Kred, is evolving how it displays a user’s influence measurement. Through an interface reminiscent of Pinterest’s tiles — a design trend adopted by many sites — anyone can browse through the visual history of a Kred user’s influence around the Web. There’s a simplicity with navigating tiles that captures a user’s attention in lieu of the list that the Kred dashboard once sported. Despite the changes, Kred continues to remain transparent about what figures make up a user’s Kred score through the tile, “Total Influence Points.”

“Kred Story is the culmination of many years of research by PeopleBrowsr. It shifts the emphasis from scores and data to people and their content,” said Andrew Grill, CEO of Kred, in a statement. “Kred Story gives everyone access to social data in an intuitive format that enhances their social media experience. It makes influence metrics useful for all of us.”

Kred now offers 16 types of tiles. With one, you can now browse the stories that a user has shared on Twitter and the number of retweets that those posts have received. Another allows you to find the Influence Kred score, a number identifying the user’s social media influence (FYI: it’s out of 1000 possible points); and the Outreach Level, which is measured by how generous users are with sharing content. You’ll also find a tile for important metrics about the number of individuals that have interacted with the Kred user, a tile dedicated to displaying the people around the social media sphere that have mentioned the user, and a tile for hashtags that have been used in conversations — just to mention a few.

Displaying a user’s social media activity in a visual manner should appeal to many users. But what we found to be particularly useful with the new changes is the demographic information on the right of the dashboard, which presents information about how the social media community is interacting with the Kred user, and the types of communities that each user belongs to. There is one caveat, however; Kred Story in its current design only presents Twitter analytics, but integration for LinkedIn and Google+ may arrive by the end of this year.

Kred Story sheds the impression that analytics has to be displayed in a complicated manner, and offers a simple solution that just about anyone can understand. “[Kred’s] beautiful visual format shows what people think is most influential about them and how they engage in social media,” said Lee Hammond, vice president of Digital for Interscope Records, who got a sneak peak at Kred Story. “Kred Story is a big step forward for social media influence measurement.”

Source : digitaltrends[dot]com