When a blogger contacted Xbox Support about her account, she got a form letter with tips — for her son. But if Xbox assumes that all gamers are boys, it may be missing out on a growing market.


Chantaal of [Insert Pop Culture Reference] emailed Xbox about downgrading her account. This is how an Xbox employee going by "Joyce" responded:

Hello Chantaal, Thank you for using XBOX Customer Support online! I am Joyce and I will be helping you today with this issue. As I understand, when your son tries to sign in to Xbox LIVE, [redacted] I know how disappointing it is when your son cannot enjoy the Xbox Live service due to this matter.


Chantaal elaborates,

For the record, I said nothing about having a son (because I don't) or about this being a boyfriend's account (cause he has his own). I simply put in a request about my account, and I get a form letter assuming I'm doing this for my son. When I mentioned this on twitter, I got a friend saying she'd gotten the exact same assumption in her responses. I know why Xbox would make the assumption, but I can't imagine why they'd go ahead and say it so blatantly in their response when no indicators were given. It's horrible PR.

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It may also reflect bad market research. According to research by ComScore (reported in the Telegraph), the biggest players of online games are actually women over 55. Granted, women do tend to play different kinds of games from men (according to ComScore, they prefer online puzzle, card, and board games), but it still seems like Xbox, which provides online gaming through its LIVE service, might be interested in learning about these differences. And in actually knowing who its customers are, rather than making baseless assumptions.

Image via Lisa F. Young/Shutterstock.com.

Xbox Fail [[Insert Pop Culture Reference], via Consumerist]

The Biggest Online Gamers Are Women Over 55, Apparently [Telegraph]