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Xbox Live Is Microsoft's New Billion Dollar Business (And Activision Wants A Piece)

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Microsoft's Xbox Live service has pulled in an estimated $1.2 billion for the Xbox 360 maker, with annual Gold subscription fees and sales of digital content combined, according to Bloomberg. Good news for... Bobby Kotick?

According to Microsoft's Dennis Durkin, the Xbox's chief operating officer, sales of Live content like movies, TV shows, Avatar items and other downloadable content items have outsold Xbox Live Gold fees, estimated at $600 million from 25 million paying users.

Microsoft's partners, like Call of Duty publisher Activision, want to share in those revenues. Activision CEO Bobby Kotick claims its his company's games, like Modern Warfare 2, that are "driving a lot of the subscription interest and certainly hours of game play." Sound fair? If so, Rockstar Games, Valve and Epic Games may also want a slice of that pie, Microsoft.

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Microsoft's Online Xbox Sales Probably Topped $1 Billion [Bloomberg]