With just a few weeks before E3 2012, Microsoft is going to cut down on its own in-house promotional and marketing efforts for the Xbox 360. In a post on the Major Nelson site, Microsoft's Larry Hryb has announced that the company will be discontinuing its Inside Xbox videos that have been shown for the past several years for Xbox 360's Xbox Live users in the US.
Hryb's message states:
We will be leveraging third-party news and video content available through a variety of existing and future partners, and supplementing this content with select first-party offerings. However, day-to-day news content and weekly programming currently offered though Inside Xbox will cease production in the United States. This includes shows like Major’s Minute, Featured Videos and Insider Moves packaged under the Inside Xbox brand.
He added that Microsoft is "currently looking at its operating model" for Inside Xbox videos in European countries but no decisions have been made. Xbox Live users in both Mexico and Japan will continue to receive first party video content from Microsoft but it apparently will not be using the Inside Xbox brand.
While Hryb is apparently staying on at Microsoft, it sounds like there have been some layoffs as a result of this change. Hyrb's final message is a big hint about this, as he states about the Inside Xbox crew, "We thank them all for their contributions to the Xbox LIVE community and wish them all the best in their future endeavors."
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