By Yvette Wohn

Opening the refrigerator to get some eggs for breakfast, I was surprised to find a strange apparatus built into one of the shelves.
“What the…”
“It’s a power juicer,” the refrigerator said, “I know you like fruit, so I decided to install this last night.”
“Wow, that’s very considerate of you, but I already have a juicer…”
“See?” screamed the juicer from the other end of the kitchen, “She doesn’t need another juicer.”
“No, she doesn’t need you,” the refrigerator replied coolly, “You can only make juice. I can make juice and refrigerate it. So take that. Maybe next week, I’ll start baking.”
The oven gasped.
“And by the way,” the refrigerator continued,” I got rid of the ice maker.”
“But I liked the ice maker!” I protested.
“Too bad for you. Clinical tests proved that eating ice stimulates disorders in the nervous system and I decided I didn’t want to be sued.”

Welcome to my hypothetical networked kitchen, where all appliances can add new functions or eliminate existing features overnight. While this scenario seems highly fictitious, it is in fact already taking place– perhaps not in the kitchen, but in the living room.

If you thought Steve Jobs was being evil in tethering the iPhone, I can’t wait to get started in talking about the Xbox360. (It is a bit painful for me to be speaking about this, because unlike a lot of people, I really like Bill Gates.)

As mentioned in introduction of the book, the Xbox360 video game console is a very smart computer, but unlike the PC, it is wholly controlled by Microsoft.

You may be thinking that is not such a big deal– after all, it’s only gaming, right? Not exactly.  On Nov. 19, Microsoft officially unleashed the New Xbox Experience for the Xbox360– adding a number of new features that evolved the game console into an all-in-one home entertainment box. All through a simple “update” that is downloaded in a few minutes through Internet access. Soon, you won’t need a separate Tivo or a DVD player– everything will be in one box.

In many ways, the Xbox360 feels like a PC. Social networking features enable users to chat with “friends” outside of the game– and even across different games. More on-demand movie viewing features have been added as well; users in the United States, for instance, can now download films using Netflix (one must subscribe to Netflix separately). Microsoft has also inked a lot of deals with film distributors and network content providers, bringing exclusive TV programs and movies to the console. I am sure movie distributors applaud devices like the Xbox360 because content can be controlled, monitored, and actually charged for.

While its features echo those available on a PC, the Xbox360 is so not a PC because you really don’t have much say in what happens. The same goes for other consoles like the PS3 and Wii. Unlike software installations on one’s PC, on a tethered console, you either have to accept the updates in whole or not. Even that is not really a choice, because if you choose the latter, you won’t be able to fix the bugs.

The problem is not only what you can control, but also when. The manufacturer [which has suddenly promoted itself to the content provider] decides when the updates will take place: Sony PS3 and Wii users will experience fairly frequent changes, while Xbox users are subject to updates once every few months. I use the term ‘update’ instead of ‘upgrade’ because users do not always agree that the changes are for the better. Regarding the New Xbox Experience, for example, users are already complaining that the new avatar system makes it difficult to find friends, and noting that the Netflix movies have poor graphic quality.

So do these new features turn me off? Forgive me for sounding like a hypocrite, but not really. I think these updates are super cool– especially the new chatting feature that lets people playing on different games still chat with each other, because most of my friends like the gory shooting games and I don’t. And yet I stand with Jonathan on opposing the mainstreamization of tethered devices.

My reason for disliking tethered devices is not so grand– it’s quite selfish. As an avid gamer, it annoys me that the closed architecture of these game consoles prevents more diverse games from being developed. It also crushes true competition, because console makers are forever trying to get exclusive content, which limits what is available to people who only have one console– or no console, since these exclusive contracts even forbid game makers from making PC versions. How unfair is it that people who don’t have consoles cannot play Fable 2 (exclusive to Xbox360), Little Big Planet (exclusive to PS3), or even Guitar Hero World Tour (exclusive to consoles)?

At least until now, PCs had the edge over consoles in massively multiplayer online role-playing games such as World of Warcraft or Lord of the Rings Online, but now that all of the consoles are connected to the Internet, that domain will soon begin to shake up.

So what does the X in Xbox stand for? To me, it’s a big fat “no.” No to creativity, no to diversity, no to genuine competition, no to playing cool games over Thanksgiving weekend.