Would You Purchase an Xbox Live Gamertag?

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
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From our front-page news:
Own an Xbox 360? Subscribe to Xbox Live? Have a cool gamertag that wasn't forced onto you because a thousand variations of the same nickname already existed? Well, Xbox live user "Hitman" sure does, and he realizes it - so much so that he's working on getting it sold. Seriously. Hard to blame him though. People will pay for virtually anything nowadays, as long as it strikes their interest.

In the case of the name "Hitman", it's wanted by virtually everyone (except me). It's one of those names that seems to scream "elite" and "top dog", and something of some vital importance. I admit, I think choosing such a popular name to use as your own moniker is a little foolish, only because it's far from being unique, or personal. If I only had to count how many times I've seen the name "Legolas" in an MMORPG...

But I digress. I might not have interest in the name, but it's clear that many people do, and I for one am curious to see how well the eBay auction performs. But it begs the question. Doesn't Microsoft have some policy against this type of action? If not, we might very-well see some other Live old-schoolers going down the same route.

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Graziano said he thought there might be some big money in selling Hitman, particularly because he said he once saw an article on a video game site that estimated "Hitman" was the most commonly used term in Xbox Live gamertags. Indeed, he said that when he plays, he commonly encounters comments like, "Wow, so you're the original Hitman?" and, "How'd you get that screen name?"


Source: CNET Gaming and Culture Blog
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
Wow, that was fast. It was still there when I first read this article. Was at $350 and climbing...
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
I have to wonder what people think before they post auctions like these. Do they actually think they are going to get away with it, especially when the mainstream media gets hold of the story? Probably now, the account is banned, so no one has the name.
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
The account had 25 feedback iirc... it was a yellow star account for sure, so no big loss if it was. Some listings like that seem to be allowed, so I bet it was a matter of being against Microsoft's EULA or some such. If MS filed something with ebay to take it down I'm sure they would have no questions asked.
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
Hm, that's a good point. I wasn't thinking about the actual Xbox Live account.

But yet again, eBay disallowed the auction, this time at the behest of Microsoft, which bans the sale or redistribution of any part of the Xbox Live service.

So now that he is trying to sell it on Craigslist, I wouldn't be surprised if MS decided to ban his account. He could very well end up with nothing at all...
 
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