Does Sony need a ‘Major Nelson?’
Posted on October 5, 2006 by Alex Donaldson If there’s one thing that Sony seems to lack, it’s a well-loved employee public figure amongst the fans. While Reggie and Miyamoto hold status as legendary with Nintendo fans, and Microsoft’s Xbox Live honcho Major Nelson provides the fans with much needed correspondence from inside the company, as the PS3 launches Sony lacks such a figure, one who can be an important buffer between the fans and the company. But does Sony need one?One of my most-visited websites is Major Nelson’s blog. It’s RSS feed sits in pride of place on my browser, and it also streams the feed directly to my Xbox using the “XBStream” software. But, I suppose some of you will be asking why, and, even more so, just who is Major Nelson?
Major Nelson is the Xbox Live GamerTag of Larry Hryb. Larry works at Microsoft. His job? The Xbox Live Director of Programming. He uses his blog to communicate valuable information and news about Xbox Live, and that’s why I visit it. It’s often the first place I can find information on new Xbox Live Arcade Games, and he’s ran excellent blog posts on the events of the Tokyo Game Show, E3 and X06.
The Major's Xbox Live Profile at the time of publishing.
Every day there are new things added to the marketplace, he posts to let the fans know what has been put up. He plays Xbox Live, and thanks to his Xbox 360 blog and gamerscore Xbox gamers everywhere see how this industry insider is doing, what he’s playing, and how good he is. And of course people can catch him online playing Xbox Live games.
Larry has become in many ways far more than the head of Xbox Live in terms of his job – he has become an icon for the fans, a figurehead of the Xbox Live userbase, somebody for them all to look to, a man who is truly passionate about the system he has helped to create. Most important of all, he has helped to build the community.
Similarly, Nintendo’s community of fans – while not yet linked by a unified service like Xbox Live – are certainly linked by those two magic names – Reggie and Miyamoto. They are practically heroes to Nintendo fans everywhere, giving them somebody to unite under when marching for Nintendo.
Miyamoto - Legend and God to Nintendo fans everywhere.
Thinking about this led me to this question – just who could Sony fans band together underneath? Who could be the figurehead of the Sony fans’ movement? Kaz “Riiiidge Racer” Hirai doesn’t really seem the type to have much interaction with the fans to me, and neither does Phil Harrison.
While they’ve both had their fair share of internet publicity thanks to the rather incredibly bad E3 2006 Press Conference, I somehow don’t see them gaining a particularly good rapport with the fans. Just for one moment imagine a blog run by Kaz Hirai – do you feel it could work?
Reggie is little more than a businessman, but yet he is asked to sign autographs on Nintendo products whenever he pays one of his regular visits to a Nintendo store. He has promised to be at one of the Nintendo stores, playing DS with and supporting fans on Wii launch night, handing out Wii consoles and signing things. I don’t know why, but I simply can’t imagine Phil Harrison hanging out with his PSP at the PS3 launch.
Major Nelson and Reggie - Even the Major had his DS signed by the ass-kicker.
The next question of course is would it be beneficial to Sony to have such a figure? Would it be necessary? This next generation of consoles is certainly being fought on more fronts and in more ways than ever before – could this be a new, unforeseen front?
Certainly the likes of Reggie, Miyamoto and Major Nelson have proven incredibly popular with the fans. Major Nelson has been an instrumental figure in the success of the extra features of the Xbox 360 – he has promoted them to the fans, and actively encourages extra user-created features such as the Xbox 360 blogs, XBStream and so on and so forth. Every one of these I have found through Major Nelson. He speaks with small-time game journalists, offering them words of encouragement, and I know for a fact he reads a lot of the gaming press in order to find out just what he and his team have done wrong and right with the Xbox 360.
Personally, I think that with Sony’s plans for a single, unified online service to rival Xbox Live with the PS3 would benefit immensely from having a figurehead within the company who acts as, for want of a better phrase a “go between” the development teams of the online service and the fans. In my eyes if anything it’s a new form of customer service that offers the user an even larger opportunity to interact with the companies that created their consoles.
Hopefully Nintendo’s message board channel will also see Nintendo staff posting on it as many of the Xbox 360 “Launch Team” have done with the official Xbox Boards, and I truly hope we can expect the same from Sony.
While it’s not something that appeals to every group of people that play games – the casual market and kids, for example, the existence of these people allows the part of the market that is most opinionated – the core gamers, those who have a very clear opinion on what they want and what is good and bad – to interact with somebody who can actually bring about change.
Hell, on a lesser note, it even gives the fanboys someone to worship.
Compared to Nintendo and Microsoft, the Sony Execs have become a joke to gamers.
While it isn’t vital, I’m certainly of the opinion that it could certainly help Sony’s online service and chances of success with it. A sense of community is definitely what is needed with a unified online service, and every community had somebody at the head.
Sony’s only problem now would be who? Right now I don’t see Ken Kutagari, Kaz Hirai or Phil Harrison being a particularly strong public figure with the fans. Despite all this, I think getting one would be a step in the right direction for Sony’s online service, whatever it may be called.
Here’s where I’m open to ideas. This is an open article; I wanted to start a debate. Do you think such a figure would help Sony? How important would it be? Who would such a person be? Feel free to reply in the comments, or click my name at the top of the article to send me an email.
The upside of being a Microsoft Employee..
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Unless Sony changes its ways and starts actually thinking of its customers instead of how to squeeze them for everything they've got, whoever would fit this role would be the public face to take all the heat - answering for Sony's Draconian DRM technologies, single-console BluRay disc limitations (I'm sure a very popular move with Blockbuster, GameStop and GameFly!) and empty promises of content (my PSP STILL sucks as a music/movie player because the online storefront they promised never materialized).
One of the reasons that Larry (Major Nelson) has been a positive impact for MS is that he actually listens to the community and communicates that information back to MS, where it SEEMS to make a difference. I doubt seriously if Sony would EVER listen to community feedback like this. They have a bad reputation of not even listening to pleading from Sony U.S.A., do you think they listen to end users?
John Porcaro, www.gamerscoreblog.com.
you may want to check out
http://www.ilovexbla.com
http://www.xblarcade.com
That's what I use they post near daily on the latest news and rumors and such.
Certainly the likes of Reggie, Miyamoto and Major Nelson have proven incredibly popular with the plans.
I think you meant to write -
Certainly the likes of Reggie, Miyamoto and Major Nelson have proven incredibly popular with the FANS.
It does add a sort of community as well, even if it is comprised only of the hardcore fanatics and haters.
nintendo and microsoft have this love for the games..
and PS3 SUCKS.
major nelson rulx... the blog of major nelson rulx...
I think the European Sony "wigs" (not Phil Harrison, but the other ones) prove to be a lot more interesting and a lot less dense than Hirai and Kutaragi. The current "three mustketeers" of Sony just can't tout the PS3 in a fun way. They make it taxing; even painful, whether reading, listening, or watching them.
More importantly, I think Sony needs reps that show interest in their fans (whether genuine or not), instead of directly treating them like full wallets. The attitude of "We sell the most, we're better, you have to buy it," is really sickening. Major/Reggie/Miyamoto leave you feeling like you WANT to buy it, not that you HAVE to.