I’ve seen a lot of “there’s only one” arguments in defense of this XBox “update” based on the idea that every advertisement has “ADVERTISEMENT” plastered underneath it. Well, I see two windows displaying advertisements, one of which slides between 3 other advertisements.

Five out of the eight tabs/blades/whatever now contain these “WE ADMIT THESE ARE ADVERTISEMENTS” advertisement boxes along with the big “THESE AREN’T ADVERTISEMENTS THESE ARE PART OF THE 60-DOLLAR-A-YEAR SOCIAL EXPERIENCE” advertisements.

So please, stop with that excuse. It doesn’t hold water.

EDIT: I don’t hate advertisements. I hate how they have taken over my connection (the amount of data being transferred at the dashboard now is incredible) and pushed aside my main uses for the XBox.

ronworkman:

Does anyone remember when ‘Opt-out’ meant that you did not want something? Well, since the new update, Xbox Live still gives you the option but unfortunately it does nothing. 

My guess is that within a week or so people will start to grasp just how poorly designed and invasive this new update is. It is terrible. It pushes gaming and social interaction out of the way and makes advertising and media the focus. 

Bonus: Enjoy watching movies in a Netflix party? Microsoft killed that without notice and added some really annoying sound effects that you cannot turn off when browsing movies.