Microsoft the All-Powerful
UPDATE, JAN 14TH @ 8:33PM: I just got back from Houston. Major Nelson at Microsoft has been in touch this evening, and we’ve had a lovely conversation via email. He seems keen to help, which bodes well for me. I also got an email from “Steve” in Xbox Escalations.
UPDATE: The article I wrote for GamePartisan concerning my ongoing Microsoft issue can now be found here. Thank you to everyone who has Dugg this, and thank you to Mike at work for putting it on Digg in the first place. I definitely owe you something from Starbucks at the least.
I’ve been given the go-ahead to discuss what has happened concerning my Microsoft issue. It’s a particularly big thing, so you may want to sit down.
I write for a couple of gaming websites at the moment - RealVG, which I helped found in 2006, and GamePartisan, which I’ve been writing for on and off since 2003. My relationship with GP has seen its ups and downs, but right now it’s at a high point and I can only see good things going for that site in the future. So, apparently, do Microsoft.
Yesterday, A Microsoft rep spoke with Jonny DeViney, the Editor in Chief of GamePartisan. While I can’t discuss the ins and outs of what the phone call involved, I can tell you that Microsoft asked DeViney to drop me from the Editorial team - to “remove any potential sources of contention” between the site and Microsoft. I’m not sure what DeViney’s answer was exactly, but the general jist of it from what I’ve heard is that he told them to take their hand and go fuck themselves.
Not content with denying me my request to be able to, y’know, pay for my Xbox Live services, they’ve now taken to flat-out attacking me by trying to lose me a writing job. Well, no. I’m very thankful that DeViney has decided to back me on this one - it would have been so easy for him to shove me out the door, and he would have valid reason to given I haven’t written anything for GP in weeks. I’ll be writing an article about this which will be going up on GP tonight, or tomorrow morning at the latest.
The gloves are off now.
January 9th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
This is an utter disgrace. I was pretty much ready to buy a 360, and am now having serious doubts about it. Let me know if there is any way I can help you with this.
Fight the power brotha!
January 9th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
JOG ON!, cry me a river then go and build me a bridge so I can get over it.
January 9th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
I still you have your gamertag up *cough*
January 9th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
Oh, I’m keeping that up. I want people to see it. That American flag? That’s there because I changed my Microsoft Passport location to the US. Funny that I can’t do that with my billing details…
January 10th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
One of Microsoft’s biggest mistakes is all the enemies they’ve made over the last 20 years or so. There are thousands of people out there who’ve been screwed over by MS, and they’re starting to suffer from the accumulation effect. You’ve got people who made their minds up that they were going to make MS pay one way or the other. That’s why there are so many programmers donating their free time towards open source development, or other things like supporting linux. Some are using their positions in major corporations and businesses to steer the decision makers away from spending their money with MS. The overall effort is costing them dearly. I can only hope to live enough to see MS die like the dirty dog that it is. Rot in hell Microsoft! Rot in hell, just like SCO!
January 10th, 2008 at 1:03 pm
I had a very similar issue over christmas due to me for some reason having my gamertag default to US, but with no address, after almost 2 hours of telephone conversations over about 5 different calls, i was told very rudely to create a new account, set that one to UK and just use that one, losing my gamerscore, achievements, save games and uno…
January 10th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
Daniel,
Next time include your address. Don’t be stupid and stupid things won’t happen to you. As for this article. Who cares? We aren’t getting the full story so what’s the point?
January 10th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
All-Powerful companies don´t need to play dirty.
January 10th, 2008 at 1:25 pm
Interestingly, I purchased a UK 360 in July 07, bought the 12 month gold subscription with vision camera pack from Amazon.com in the US, had it sent to the UK and am currently using that as my live gold subscription.
So, it’s not even consistent.
January 10th, 2008 at 1:29 pm
[...] pounds. Microsoft refuses. Writer complains. Microsoft tries to get him kicked off his writing gig?read more | digg [...]
January 10th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
Not to stir the pot, but you may want to contact the consumerist. There is a virtual army of individuals there that help consumers get connected to the right person in a company.
January 10th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
I have been trying to decide if I should buy an Xbox 360 or a PS3. I got burned on my purchase of the 1st generation xbox three years ago when the DVD drive stopped working after two years of ownership. Microsoft lost me as a customer when the second unit did this as well, I prefer to troubleshoot my PC not my game console. This drove me away from the Xbox. The PS2 hardware has been extremely reliable over the years. I have had two regular dvd players burn out on me while my 1st Gen PS2 has been rock solid as a gaming system and backup DVD player. After reading about your ordeal of poor customer service and reading about the Xbox 360 hardware problems other gamers have had I have finally made my mind up to stay away from the Xbox 360 and buy a PS3.
January 10th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
Get over it. Nobody cares. Everyone’s been burned by some company at some point.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
hi, doesn’t surprise me they treated you like this - i had a mix-up with my xbox live account and the credit card they had on file and it took 2 months to straighten out! in the meantime my subscription auto-renewed and they said i had to pay it (even though i had no control over the account!!). i complained more and finally got it straightened out but it took another 2 weeks!!
January 10th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
You’re Article is full of bullshit….and FUD…and if you’re boss had any balls he would have fired your ass…
January 10th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
yardman right on this is just some fag that has made a big stink its what you get for not going with the grain
Loyal (and safe) FanBoy
RandomHero4507
Edit: Nope, you’re not posting your website address in here if you’re going to slag me off, bucko.
January 10th, 2008 at 3:36 pm
From the amount of diggs on this article some people empathize .
January 10th, 2008 at 3:59 pm
One234IDeclareAThumbWar:
Where I live is only Microsoft’s business if I choose to make it their business. Otherwise it’s not. If you don’t mind strangers having your personal info, that’s your business.
January 10th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
This seems to me like it is the lingering spectre of the R6:LV demo debacle. Don’t know if anybody remembers, but essentially the demo for R6:Vegas was held back in the US due to it’s inclusion on the demo disc for XBox mag. It is a simple and standard business tactic; don’t compete with yourself. They wanted to have the inclusion of the demo help sales all the publication, and it’s availablity on Live would have cut into those sales. Well, we gamers are a resourceful bunch, and knowing that it was currently available to EU players, many of US users switched to EU accounts to be able to D/L the demo.
I have the feeling MS is being obstinant about it because they feel that they view too much potential for abuse if they allow regional shifing of Live accounts. I can tell you that it would be perfectly feasable for MS to implement a method of migrating one Tag’s data to another’s and then invalidate the original one, possibly even being able to use the same GamerTag. It’s not like they track Live accounts by the GamerTag on the back-end. I view it as a similar set as a domain name being associated to IP addresses. The problem is this, to whom do they give this power? As you’ve already pointed out, their Customer Support people are tools who are supervised by slightly better paid tools. So their other option is to have a specific group that takes care of this. Well, no you are talking about extra training for a specialized group. Is this their only task, and they sit around all day waiting for someone (who speaks their language), and has need of this specialized service? The alternative is to have these people sit in the standard queue and then have those specific calls routed to those specific people. If you’ve ever worked with Call Manager, you would have jsut laughed a lot and told me where to stick the latter idea. Plus, when one of these specially trained people do become available, does the person in need of their special abilities get to cut in front of the person who is just ‘in line’ or will they have to wait until their turn comes THEN wait for one of the specialists to be available. There are some serious business-side logistical issues with what you want beyond the technological issues. I would also be less than surprised to discover that this is the way the publishers want it. Has anybody checked this issue out with the Wii and PS3? If part of the reason for this is developer/publisher pressure, you can bet it’ll be the same. Ooo…and it would be intersting to see how big of an issue this is.
Don’t take this as me supporting the practice though. I think it’s bullshit, and at the very least somebody shoudl put on their big-boy pants and come clean as to WHY this is not an option.
As far as the attitude of their Customer Service people goes; that is totally unaccecptable. I’ve worked in CS before and I will tell you that those people take A LOT of flack every day, all day. People jsut don’t call CS when they are happy about something. This will eventually darken the soul of any CS worker who is worth their salt to begin with (granted the cycle is 50% the fault of the CS agents that are tools, but do your part too…not that you haven’t). Best advice to dealing with them is to not curse, raise your voice, berate, be rude, etc. This is a two way street though, and once THEY cross that line the best bet is to get a case/issue/call ID # (are these still used?), the rep’s name (full if they will give it but I never would), their ext#, and possibly even the location of their call center and end the call. Then call immediatly back and state that you would like to speak to a superviser. Don’t go into the details of your Live relocation issue, simply discuss the behavior of the previous CS agent (while being aware that the superviser you are speaking with will likly have no idea who this agent is as they are probably in different call centers, but hsould be able to notify that agents direct superviser). If you run into roadblocks read the Consumerists page on how to legally record a call to the CS dept. That could help you get your point about rudeness across.
Best of luck to you Ben, but I think you have a serious uphill battle ahead of you, and that any others in your situation don’t have your motivation. Stick with it and see if you can get them to see the light.
The funny in all this for me: I’m kinda writing a defence of MS using Gentoo. HA!
January 10th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
Thanks for the information!
January 10th, 2008 at 6:28 pm
Why don’t you stop whining about ‘being an immigrant’. They’re being idiots, yes, but it’s morons like you always playing the race card or discrimination card that make it so you can’t even taken seriously. Yeah, they’re being greedy, and it’s still a shitty deal, but stop trying to jack up the politics of it.
January 10th, 2008 at 7:54 pm
[...] Microsoft the All-Powerful [...]
January 10th, 2008 at 10:35 pm
It’s sad how much suspicious trolling there is in this thread. Microsoft-drones? Or did IQs just drop suddenly?
Because it is damn obvious that this is a shitty way of Microsoft to behave.
January 11th, 2008 at 1:14 am
[...] Source [Ben Paddon] [...]
January 11th, 2008 at 7:13 am
I 100% agree with yardman… you should have been fired. Stop writing please. Maybe you should consider another job like Wal-mart or something like that… you’d just be better at it.
January 11th, 2008 at 7:32 am
Hi Ben,
I too am having issues with Xbox live something else also damn niggly (although not as bad)
I created an Xbox Live acount on my Xbox 1 about 3 years ago, I used a name which I use on at least 40 forums across the internet, I like it and it’s ‘me’ as far as I’m concerned.
I quit Xbox Live for my XB1 due to a hardware failure about 2 years ago, I eventually got a new one but never signed back up.
My Xbox account is now locked out, forever, I can never ever get that gamertag back for no apparent reason.
I’ve emailed support, I’ve started a rant on Xbox.com forums, I’ve emailed MajorNelson (and got responses too!) essentually I was told ‘well if you don’t keep it active, you lose it, so there’s some incentive to keep it active’
Effectively blackmail, if you want to keep your gamertag you must pay for a subscription, even if you can’t or don’t want to use live.
(Overseas holiday, New baby, Very ill, console stolen and slow insurance - all kinds of reasons to terminate the subscription for a while)
I actually DO have ALL the recovery information for this account, yet it simply won’t let me recover it.
I’m 99.9% sure it’s a case of some smart little fellow in MS diddlying with a few flags on a database (funny enough same as your account issue) but do you think anyone will listen or address it?
Piss poor.
I never thought I’d say this but my PS3 is getting a lot more use than I thought it would ,…….
Here’s the URL to me talking about it on the XBOX.COM forums.
http://forums.xbox.com/17297131/ShowPost.aspx
January 11th, 2008 at 8:19 am
oooo Microsoft cant edit him but he feels the need to edit me you ask for a website retard!
By RandomHero4507 on Jan 10, 2008
yardman right on this is just some fag that has made a big stink its what you get for not going with the grain
Loyal (and safe) FanBoy
RandomHero4507
Edit: Nope, you’re not posting your website address in here if you’re going to slag me off, bucko.
January 11th, 2008 at 8:32 am
[...] pounds. Microsoft refuses. Writer complains. Microsoft tries to get him kicked off his writing gig?read more | digg story .ae_table_horiz { width:auto; height:auto; background-color:; } [...]
January 11th, 2008 at 8:47 am
Microsoft “owns” many publications, and they often abuse their power to get critical writers kicked. This even happened to Tamura Jones, the guy who wrote the Undocumented Windows book. You are in pretty good company.
January 11th, 2008 at 9:03 am
sue them! you have a discrimination claim. This may sound weird but if you actually have a better claim if you let your your boss let you go… this presents the claim for lost wages. Get fired, then go after them.
January 11th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
[...] full details are here and here. News | Erik David Even | | Share this [...]
January 11th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
[...] pounds. Microsoft refuses. Writer complains. Microsoft tries to get him kicked off his writing gig?read more | digg [...]
January 12th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Ummmmm, so what did you really say to them? So far it’s your word against theirs.
January 15th, 2008 at 3:48 am
I dont buy it. A site with an 11million plus Alexa ranking? thats visitors in the teens. Not 17,000 but 17 per day. No way would MS even acknowledge the nastiest article. I have working in this industry for long enough now and actually personally know the people listed in your article, and I cant imagine any of them acting like that. Not once has MS put pressure on us to remove anything that was an opinion.
I really feel like someone wanted you fired, or didnt get the joke. If you would have said Sony, it might have seemed legit. Its common knowledge that porter novelli is terrible (Sonys PR company)Dont call bullshit unless you can prove it.
January 15th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
[...] pounds. Microsoft refuses. Writer complains. Microsoft tries to get him kicked off his writing gig?read more | digg story Filed under: Xbox [...]
January 19th, 2008 at 2:25 pm
Historically speaking, people who bear witness to injustice will generally act.
I’m glad that you have posted your injustice for the world to see and that M$ is being held accountable in the court of public opinion.
The language of business is the bottom line. Money. Your story has already harmed M$ much more than what it would have cost them to satisfy their customer. With enough response they may rethink their policy and those involved at the M$ end who are responsible for their failed policy will hopefully suffer repercussions from their management. Maybe an overseas vendor will lose a contract, etc.
Good luck!
January 28th, 2008 at 5:16 am
Thats right play the sims 2 I dont think you can take on any of the big boy Xbox games
Add A Comment