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Greg Miller: Phil Spencer retirement was not planned

It happens. I posted in another thread anecdotal evidence of a situation that looks similar to what went down here. This makes me think that Microsoft is changing current plans for Xbox. I don't know what that means or how agile they can be, but you do not let Phil and Sarah go to stay the course.
 
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phil-spencer-xbox.gif
 
Here come with those videos...
Clickbait, ragebait, while different the actions are the same. Content creators are all gonna be barking the same shit for clicks and views.
No shit. You don't announce your retirement and then it's out the door before the weekend is over.
Yeah, exactly, I don't know why people are so shocked about that. Retirement is typically planned and announced in advanced, and this was everything but that, it was way too sudden. Sarah Bond's resignation just feels like a response to his "retirement", which I could certainly understand if it was something she didn't agree with.
 
Of course it wasn't planned, but that misses the entire point of his firing.

He was fired because for over 10 years, he failed to make Xbox the #1 product in gaming. You can fault Satya Nadella for a lot of things, but getting rid of Spencer isn't one of them. Nadella made the decision that any rational person would make; you were given close to $100,000,000,000, and you failed to use that money to make a successful product. You've failed on a level that is incomprehensible to 99% of humanity.

Aaron Greenberg is next. You can't be an executive at a trillion dollar company and fail to execute. It sucks to say this, but a bunch of people at Xbox are going to be fired because of Phil Spencer's decisions.
 
Obvious... anyone, even here, that believes PS officially talked about retirement last year and/or he and sarah will help on transition are gullible idiots.
 
Well that much was obvious.

I'm more interested in hearing how things went down with Sarah. She was being prepped as his successor, but at the same time Phil's exit statement says he was preparing and working with Asha, so what was really going on there?
 
Well that much was obvious.

I'm more interested in hearing how things went down with Sarah. She was being prepped as his successor, but at the same time Phil's exit statement says he was preparing and working with Asha, so what was really going on there?
Satya probably saw Sarah as more Phil, and decided Xbox needed to do something different.
 
He's old and he probably was against AI, at least privately/internally. Of course you're going to get replaced in a big corpo in 2026 by an AI slave. MS is pretty much dead just like Sony and whatever good games come out of their pockets, its not because of their decisions.
 
We're all on the outside looking in here, but that seems obvious. If this was just a planned 'its time to step down and enjoy life' thing, there would be a few months between the announcement and his last day. Nobody at this level 'retires' at the start of the weekend and is out the door on Monday unless it was a 'retire or be fired' ultimatum.
 
I think they called it retirement out of respect for him having been part of the company pretty much since leaving school. Would've made a better impression though if it didn't happen to be at the same time Sarah Bond was let go.
 
Someone posted a couple tweets about a board meeting vote that happened this past week but not sure how truthful it was, not like the poster had receipts and I didn't recognize the Twitter handle
 
But why now and not earlier?
Now they have to deal with Magnus and other important decisions, made by Spencer.
MS was so displeased by Spencer that they fired him. It does tells me enough about Magnus and of the upcoming games.

Probably Call of Duty performance more than anything. And the mark down in an investment value they reported in gaming
 

Where's the evidence? What even is the actual claim - what does 'not planned' actually mean? That could mean he was suddenly fired or he suddenly retired for personal reasons.

It's so vague as to be meaningless. But it's intriguing and gets people to click on your video. Everyone thinks they know what it means, meanwhile it actually doesn't explain anything.
 
Well that much was obvious.

I'm more interested in hearing how things went down with Sarah. She was being prepped as his successor, but at the same time Phil's exit statement says he was preparing and working with Asha, so what was really going on there?
Corpo-speak. Really can't believe any of it.
 
Where's the evidence? What even is the actual claim - what does 'not planned' actually mean? That could mean he was suddenly fired or he suddenly retired for personal reasons.

It's so vague as to be meaningless. But it's intriguing and gets people to click on your video. Everyone thinks they know what it means, meanwhile it actually doesn't explain anything.
🙄

Where is the evidence?


Buddy, open your eyes
 
The thing about Phil that still bothers me - I appreciated that he was a gamer. That this authenticity could lend some benefit to making actual good games from this overly executive-ized industry. It did not pan out that way.

As a gamer, could Phil not realize early in development that some of these games he was previewing were dogshit, and then try to get them on track before release? I feel like he needs to take some responsibility for that. What's the point of having gamers in leadership roles if they're going to greenlight mid-tier slop anyway?
 
I said what I said and it was a factual statement.

Do you always want to believe extremely vague claims made without evidence?
I have reasons to 100% believe what was said here and no I dont want him to burn a source that IF he heard something likely only a few people have heard some keys words
 
So what's the gameplan then if Xbox is forging ahead? Obviously not stay the course because this was all Phil's plan along the way. Gamepass, 3rd party publishing, etc.

What changes?
 
🙄.
Is it even worth to be in denial at this point in time? 🤷🏻‍♂️

lol, denial of what? What is the claim being made by this vague comment?

And why do you think I would give a shit whether Phil Spencer is fired or not? Like many, I thought he should have been fired long ago. I also carry no water for Xbox, because I'm just some guy and a gamer and not a fanboy.
 
Phil arriving at the office in the morning and he sees balloons and cake and stuff:
"What is going on?"
"We are having a retirement party"
"Oh, I wasn't told. Who is retiring?"
"you"
Surprised Excuse Me GIF
 
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But why now and not earlier?
Now they have to deal with Magnus and other important decisions, made by Spencer.
MS was so displeased by Spencer that they fired him. It does tells me enough about Magnus and of the upcoming games.
Was Magnus actually a Phil Spencer idea? I never heard him speak of it; in fact, I think Nadella has spoken of the hybrid console but never Phil himself.
 
Asked where is the evidence, responds with the same question.

I see that you didn't manage to find or point to the evidence.

Come on then genius, given the news that's factually available, what do you believe to be true then?

Why is Phil's effective retirement date Monday? Why did Sarah "resign" with immediate effect and not even get so much as a mention from Satya in his statement? And most importantly, why both of them at exactly the same time?
 
I have reasons to 100% believe what was said here and no I dont want him to burn a source that IF he heard something likely only a few people have heard some keys words

We talked about this already. Is it hard proof? No. But just takes some basic common sense to know this was a firing and not a retirement. I imagine we will get more reporting on this confirming that is the case.
 
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Naw if they were free falling and honestly didnt care then there wouldn't have been any changes made... something has to be changing for them to even go through the trouble of all of this.

I think one of the strangest and mostly commonly repeated sentiments here is that Microsoft don't care about Xbox or that it's insignificant because of the larger profits in other areas of the business.

It's an idea that doesn't make any sense but it never dies. Of course the Xbox division matters, they've put so much money into it.
 
Naw if they were free falling and honestly didnt care then there wouldn't have been any changes made... something has to be changing for them to even go through the trouble of all of this.
Its AI. MS will try to integrate AI into game development.

Depending of their expectations/ambitions, they could be thinking like Azure or Office but for gaming. Or they just simply are using this move to go with the waves of the AI bubble until it pops.
 
The thing about Phil that still bothers me - I appreciated that he was a gamer. That this authenticity could lend some benefit to making actual good games from this overly executive-ized industry. It did not pan out that way.

As a gamer, could Phil not realize early in development that some of these games he was previewing were dogshit, and then try to get them on track before release? I feel like he needs to take some responsibility for that. What's the point of having gamers in leadership roles if they're going to greenlight mid-tier slop anyway?
I don't think you need "gamers" as leaders. You need competent leaders who can make the right decision at the right time.

Matt Booty has been responsible for making sure the right games were being made, made well, and released on track. Matt Booty has been shit at his job for over a decade now. Phil should have fired or moved Booty years ago.

Somehow he still has a job.
 
Its AI. MS will try to integrate AI into game development.

Depending of their expectations/ambitions, they could be thinking like Azure or Office but for gaming. Or they just simply are using this move to go with the waves of the AI bubble until it pops.

AI is already being integrated into game development. And that will continue regardless of whether there is an AI bubble and regardless of whether it pops or not.

The technology is never going away. Sorry.
 
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