Halt the 360 Update from disabling "Unauthorized" Memory Units

To:  Microsoft Entertainment & Devices Division, Microsoft Corporation

We the undersigned want you to remove from the upcoming Dashboard update the portion that will no longer allow products such as the Datel XB360 MAX Memory (and possibly some Hard Drives, we don't know because you didn't inform anyone properly and are not communicating about the issue) to work because they are “Unauthorized”. The “Unauthorized” Memory Units offer an excellent advantage to customers over the sole remaining “Authorized” Memory Unit you manufacture. The Datel XB360 MAX Memory offers four to eight times the storage and this storage is upgradeable through a standard storage media. It also costs much less based on storage capacity and works as well or better than your overpriced Memory Unit. These “Unauthorized” products have been sold to many customers from reputable retailers such as Best Buy and Amazon without the customers having any knowledge of it being “Unauthorized” and possibly being disabled at your whim. In fact, they are always placed on store shelves near many Xbox 360 accessories that are manufactured and “Authorized” by you.

If this update does go out as planned then there will be many people that will have to recover their GamerTag, or cancel Xbox Live because they don't have a storage solution since you will have killed it. Even if they do purchase an overpriced “Authorized” storage solution they will never get those game saves back, or the Halo video that they love showing to friends. Your (800) 4MY-XBOX line will explode with phone calls from people wondering what happened to their system. This will make legitimate calls concerning the well documented failures that the 360 is prone to all the more stressful for the customers and your overworked support line. Many people will probably believe that the 360 has died and you should replace it. It will be difficult to explain to the people that what used to work, you simply disabled. Besides, you really don't need another misstep in public opinion for either the failure rate and/or customer support.

There are many scenarios where your Memory Unit is unacceptable. Someone needs to carry his/her GamerTag and all of his/her Rock Band tracks over to a friend's house for a party to play on a friend's 360. Well, the friend already has a Hard Drive installed so that is not a possibility, and your Memory Unit can only hold 4-5 tracks, but 4GB gives him plenty of room. Or someone simply runs out of space and needs an extra 4GB and does not want to upgrade to the insanely expensive 120GB Hard Drive. You should not bully the competition out, but rather offer comparable or better accessories than what the competition is offering.

You have yet to explain the purpose for this, and it has nothing to do with piracy or game save swapping as some in the video game community have suggested. The "Unauthorized" Memory Unit is unnecessary for these procedures and these things happened before the “Unauthorized” Memory Units existed. This simply has to do with selling more expensive accessories. You should halt this immediately and consider another way of informing customers that only “Authorized” accessories are guaranteed to work with all updates. Spin it into a positive before the Natal launch, that your “Authorized” products are better because X, and have support guaranteed throughout all of the continuing improvements and added functionality pushed to the system with Dashboard updates. We would hope that you recognize the need for consumers to have choice and options and this conscience will prevent you from ever disabling “Unauthorized” accessories, but it is imperative that there be a significant amount of time where customers know the risk of you disabling non-Microsoft products BEFORE PURCHASE.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

The Halt the 360 Update from disabling "Unauthorized" Memory Units Petition to Microsoft Entertainment & Devices Division, Microsoft Corporation was created by and written by Daniel Phillips (cavemailman@gmail.com).  This petition is hosted here at www.PetitionOnline.com as a public service. There is no endorsement of this petition, express or implied, by Artifice, Inc. or our sponsors. For technical support please use our simple Petition Help form.