Microsoft's Moore Refutes Xbox 360 Conspiracy Theories

Microsoft's Peter Moore has taken an opportunity to publically refute speculation that his company is deliberately restricting supplies of its Xbox 360 console, due to launch in North America on Tuesday and in the rest of the world shortly afterwards. Talking to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Moore commented: "I've seen all of the conspiracy theories. Somewhere in Roswell, New Mexico, we have a hangar where we're stockpiling it, creating false shortages. No." He went on to indicate that the company is "...trying to get as many units to retail as we possibly can." Some recent comments by retailers such as Game Crazy, which released a financial statement revealing that its "initial allocation of the new Xbox 360 consoles will be below original expectations... we believe this issue to be industry-wide", have engendered further concern with both sellers and prospective buyers of the console, with Microsoft's latest estimates calling for 2.75 million to 3 million Xbox 360 worldwide unit sales in the first 90 days of sales, but spread out over the multiple launch territories. Some observers have pointed out that, due to the non-staggered nature of the Xbox 360 launch, availability of the console in each individual territory may still appear very limited to consumers, with many U.S. stores now noting that their second Xbox 360 shipment will arrive after Christmas, with their first one already sold out. Nonetheless, Moore defended this multi-territory approach, explaining to the Post-Intelligencer: "You can challenge the decision, but we made a decision a long time ago that we're going to ship this holiday in the three major regions of the world. I think when the dust settles, it will be proven to be the right thing, and it will become the default way that you launch a video-game console in our industry."