Wednesday 18 September 2013

Hundreds of TV Show Ideas Being Considered by Microsoft

There are hundreds of TV show ideas currently in consideration at Microsoft as the company behind Xbox One seeks to make a real push with its original TV programming.

While it's already been discussed publicly that Microsoft plans to pursue original Xbox TV programming, Microsoft corporate VP Phil Spencer offered some sense of the scope of the initiative at this point in an interview with Bloomberg. Speaking about the Los-Angeles-based production company that is working on TV show concepts, he said, "They have literally hundreds of ideas that they are incubating right now. We will have some new announcement for TV shows coming pretty soon."

The only project announced to date is the Halo series that acclaimed film director Steven Spielberg is contributing to. That project was announced back in May, but Microsoft has yet to reveal any real details about the show except to say it will not be exclusive to Xbox Live.

The hundreds of ideas Spencer spoke of shouldn't be taken to mean that hundreds of shows will be produced by Microsoft. Of those ideas, it's possible only a handful (or less) ever go anywhere. But the sheer number does, to some extent, demonstrate how serious Microsoft is about producing this kind of entertainment, which it has been looking into for quite some time -- it was among those interested in securing Conan O'Brien's next show before he signed on with TBS in 2010.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and entertainment studios president Nancy Tellam (a former CBS executive hired last year to lead the charge for original Xbox TV content) were meeting with people in Hollywood earlier this year in an attempt to bring more entertainment content to Xbox One. As it was described by an insider in June, the purpose of the meetings was "to reiterate Microsoft's commitment to transitioning its business to devices and services and to explaining that Hollywood entertainment is a big part of that. Microsoft in the past has just dipped a toe but now has a real commitment."

Additionally, Microsoft has secured an exclusivity arrangement for NFL content on Xbox One, and the ESPN app on Xbox 360 will be making the transition to One. It's also telling that the first TV spot for Xbox One centered around non-gaming functionality.

What do you think about Microsoft making a real attempt to produce original TV programming? Let us know the sort of shows you hope it produces in the comments.

Chris Pereira is a freelance writer who already has too many things to watch on Netflix without Microsoft producing even more shows. Check out what he's saying on Twitter and follow him on IGN.


Source : ign[dot]com

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