First let me say that I am very happy that Microsoft decided to do the smart thing and remove the DRM restrictions and the 24 hour check in. As it stands, this is the better path for the majority of gamers. No that that is out of the way we can better focus on a future that benefits everyone. Since its reveal, the Xbox One has endured a lot of negative talk, reaction, and press from its marketing as an “all in one entertainment device” to its now old DRM policies. Even after Microsoft released a statement about its new policies on June 6th, the statement, while it answered some questions, generated more confusion and created more questions. There was however, one little gold nugget buried beneath the dung heap that had been the “Xbone” up until now. That gold nugget was the “Family Share Plan” or “Shared Games Library”. While some of its finer points were still unclear, the Shared Games Library would have allowed a Gold member to share his entire games library to any 10 people who were a part of his “family” (I imagine they referred to it as a “family” instead of “friends” to make it more appealing to a wider audience). Nine people could have access to all the games that you had and be able to play them for who knows how long. Digital sharing, the scale of which had never been seen before would be available to those who owned an Xbox One. Unfortunately, the path that Microsoft initially took to get to this digital utopia would have come at the expense of our ability to treat games as we had in the previous generation. If anything, yesterday’s events showed that not all of us were as ready to switch over to digital as Microsoft would have liked us to have been. As it stands now, the digital sharing plan that would have been possible is no longer an option. It sucks, I know, I was looking forward to it myself but just because it’s not happening at this moment doesn’t that it won’t happen down the road. Microsoft still wants us to be in the digital world. The entire company is in the process of being restructured to become a “devices and services” company. A “devices and services” company is exactly the kind of company that would want us to embrace digital products. Like the article I posted states, “Microsoft’s vision of a digital future is delayed, but still alive”. This tells me that there is no reason why the Shared Games Library can’t still happen. They obviously have the infrastructure and the will to do it, they just need a better way of implementing and the way to implement it is by giving us a choice. Here are my ideas as to how they can still make the Shared Games Library happen. 1. Person A decides to give access to one of his games to Person B 2. Person A receives a prompt asking him if he wants to share his game with Person B 3. Person A says yes and is given a notification which would say something like this a. “By sharing Call of Duty 83: Nursing Home Warfare, you and Person B are agreeing to the condition that both of your consoles will be required to login to Xbox LIVE every 24 hours until Person B no longer wishes to have access to the game or when you decide not to allow Person B to have access to the game. Do you agree? 4. Person A says yes and a digital license granting access to the game is sent to Person B 5. Person B logins to Xbox LIVE and receives a notification telling him that Person A is giving him shared access to a game. 6. Person B clicks the notification, a prompt comes up asking him if he wants access to the game or not 7. Person B says yes and is given a similar notification as described in Step 3. a. “By accessing this game, which is owned by Person A, you are agreeing to the condition that your console, as well as Person A’s console, will be required to login to Xbox LIVE every 24 hours until you no longer want access to the game or until Person A no longer gives you access to it. Do you agree? 8. Person B says yes and is given access to the game. He can now play it offline for the next 24 hours. 9. 24 hours pass and both Person A and Person B receive notifications about the status of the game as it applies to each individual. 10. Person B can request to continue to play the game and if Person A agrees, access will then be given back to Person B for the next 24 hours. 11. If Person A declines access to Person B, the digital license is removed from Person B’s account/console and is returned to Person A 12. The digital download of the game is still in Person B’s hard drive and when accessed he is given a prompt notifying him that the does not have a license to play the game but can acquire one for X amount of dollars and continue from wherever he left off. This sharing ability would be restricted to games that were purchased from the console digitally and will not work for games that were bought at retail. Digitally acquired games would be packaged with the necessary “sharing license” or code that would enable this. Obviously Microsoft would need to talk to the publishers and see what they think. Give them the option to allow their games to be shared this way or not and so on. To make the deal sweeter and make digital games more appealing (i.e. sell more), Microsoft and publishers could come to an agreement to give consumers incentives to buy the games digitally. Make the games $10 cheaper for day of release downloads, give digitally bought games exclusive content, allow pre-ordering of digital games which would give access to betas and such, and have special digital sales and promotions. These are just a few of my ideas on the topic. There is no reason why it can’t happen, it just needs to be implemented properly.