FEBRUARY 22, 2009 • The Seattle Post-Intelligencer obtained and verified an internal Microsoft Corp. financial document indicating that more than half of Xbox Live members are $49.99 Gold subscriptions. The document dates to February of 2008, and shows that 56% of Xbox Live members worldwide were Gold subscribers. In the U.S., 60% were Gold memberships.

Impact: Microsoft has always been quiet about the number of subscribers that are Gold members versus free Silver members. The company had claimed that a “significant” majority were Gold subscribers. Whether, 56%represents a significant majority is of course up for debate. Nevertheless, we believe that having over 50% of users willing to pay the annual subscription fee is a pretty solid achievement. It would really be to the industry’s benefit if Microsoft was more forthcoming with that information. As the system ages we would expect that ratio to start to decline and we naturally wonder if that is the reason for Microsoft’s silence.