Hi All,

today I wanted to subscribe to the Creators Club. On the Microsoft web page I have read:

The XNA Creators Club is available on Xbox LIVE Marketplace for $49 for a four-month subscription or $99 for an annual subscription.

But I am from Austria(Europe) and I have seen that the price is the same in Euro...but 49€ is much more money than 49$, is it possible to get the US Dollar price on my Xbox Live marketplace?

THX

Stefan

No. Microsoft and its subsidiaries set the price that they feel the market will bear, and that supports their cost in each of the markets. (And, for something like the "creator's club," it's even unclear which specific costs the subscription fee bears -- I doubt XNA in itself is a money-making operation right now.) The only way you can get the US price is to be signed up for Live! in the US.

You can tell Microsoft put a great deal of thought into that price.  It's just coincidence that the price in pounds is exactly the same as the price in dollars.  :-P

In the US a CC membership costs $99, and in the UK is costs about $200. yup.

Pretty sure last time I bought my 12 months it was either £60 or £65, which equates to $120 - $130... not sure where you get the $200 figure from.

Aphid:

In the US a CC membership costs $99, and in the UK is costs about $200. yup.

That's a bit of a ridiculous figure. The annual subscription in the UK is £65 -- if the dollar-per-pound strength was over 3:1 (200/65) then I'm pretty sure I'd have a big box of dollars under my bed :P

But yeah, since you buy via the Marketplace in your current locale, you need to pay in your locale's currency. I know you can change your country in your billing address via Account Management, but I doubt that'd change the currency used.

99€ = 152.8362 US$

i already suffer this with the ps3 499$ !=499€.

499 € = 770.3562 US$!!!

but well i am indeed conscious that it will not change in some time.

Having lived in Europe for a long time, and now living in the US for a long time but going back every year, I think I know what the problem is. The Europeans don't understand how extremely integrated and competetive the US market is. It really is the most competetive, and most smoothly functioning market in the world. That leads to two things: a race to the bottom in price, and a race to "barely good enough" in quality (to lower the price, naturally). The European markets just can't compare.

Also, I think Europeans underestimate just how effective (or affordable) the American service market (and now, I guess, the Indian/Egypt/Whatever service market) is. In Europe, a businessman won't hire people unless he has to, because people require lots of payroll taxes, and once hired, it's really hard to get rid of people. In the US, you hire ideally ahead of the curve, because payroll taxes are very low, and laying off employees if you don't need them is, in most states, fairly straightforward.

The sales tax in the US (which is actually very similar to the VAT in Europe, even though it's not called a VAT) is also generally significantly lower, no matter how much people complain about it. I guess the reason is that, here, the sales tax is added after the price tag -- in Europe, the price tag includes the sales tax.

This highly streamlined economy does lead to lower prices overall, and a greater shared wealth overall; I'm pretty sure that most economists would agree. Hence, I think this is one reason why prices abroad for US products are generally more expensive. I believe there's also the problem of the extra middle hand -- the company that would sell stuff to you in the US, often has to go through a third party abroad, for legal, culture and language reasons; that additional company will add additional cost (because they won't work for free).

How much does this have to do with how pricing is set for Xbox Live!, consoles, and services in the US versus elsewhere? I don't know, but I'd be surprised if it didn't play into it at all. And for all the politically active people out there: I describe why economics makes things and services originated in the US cheaper to buy in the US. I don't make any claim about whether low price of goods is the best possible goal for a society. If anyone makes a political comment (as opposed to discussing the price of CC), the thread will probably be edited and closed. There are better forums for such things :-)

But, yeah, if you want cheaper prices, move to the US. That's true for potato chips, gasoline, labor, and pretty much everything else from what I've been able to ascertain. So why not Xbox?

That was extremely informative Jon. Having lived in the US my whole life, always nice to hear an outsiders perspective of things. Until this thread, I was unaware that people paid more for CC in other countires. Guess I've learned my new thing for the week.

jwatte:

But, yeah, if you want cheaper prices, move to the US. That's true for potato chips, gasoline, labor, and pretty much everything else from what I've been able to ascertain. So why not Xbox?

Or stay in Europe if you want cheaper car insurance, health care (comparing to private in Europe here) and legal fees.

Other odd things I noticed since moving here breafast cereal and herbs/spices also seem VERY expensive compared to the UK. Never worked those out.

Somewhere in this forum, there is a thread where we explained how this difference came to be... The prices in each region were set about equal *when we set them*. The global economy has changed since then, and we're not adjusting prices to match the relative strength of any one country's economy.

The price has always been 65 pounds or 99 dollars. Originally, the exchange rate between those two values was about equal. Today, they are not. We don't adjust the subscription price daily based on global currency exchange rates. I think you'll find that there's nothing surprising or new about that fact -- it's pretty standard in terms of any consumer goods or services.

If you don't think that's fair, then maybe you think salaries in Europe should be decreased as well, to compare equally to how they compared to US salaries two years ago? :-P

If only the US/UK government had a connect website where we could complain and ask for this 'bug' to be fixed... I for one would love to see this exchange rate issue fixed before I go back for what will probably be the most expensive visit to my family ever.

;-)

 

You could stay home and not put your money into the European economy. Then you'd be doing your part to fix the bug. ;-)

 

Yep. Everything is much cheaper over here..

These days you can get a brand new Nvidia 8800 GTX for $375 which is about 242 Euros.

here in mexico the xna creators club membership costs almost the same as the american one

in the us the 1 year membership costs 99 dollars and here costs 1100 pesos with an exchange rate of 10.5 pesos per dollar

i dont remember well but i think the 4 month membership costs aprox 550 pesos

so no major difference in prices over here in the xna creators club membership

Stefan,

I don't even know if it's available in Austria but if you're a student you should check out Microsoft DreamSpark (http://downloads.channel8.msdn.com/).

DreamSpark offers students free downloads of software (including Visual Studio 2008 Professional), and also free Creator's Club memberships.

Actually I don't think I've come across it on the forum, so it would be great of one of the mods could sticky something pointing more people toward this.

- Trevor

Thank you for the help! I'm a student, but Microsoft DreamSpark isn't available in Austria...
Never mind, I have paid 49€ for a four-month subscription...

I think it is possible to pay the price in US Dollar. But you have to choose United States by creating the LIVE account..later you can't change the country settings!

- Stefan

 

This kind of thing just irritates me immensly! :(

CC turns out to cost me NOK819 (Norwegian Kroner) instead of the about NOK509 that $99 converts to in the currency market. That is about a 60% difference!

As far as I can see I don't get access to any special services/software for that 60% extra, it's exactly the same as US customers get. It is not that NOK819 is particularely expensive all in all, but when I see that others paying substantially less for the same service I feal cheated!

Jwatte metions market differences, but those rules don't really apply to the internet software/service market which to a very large degree is a global market with dollars as the currerncy. You get the same product no matter where you are in the world and you pay the same price. (At least 90% of the software and services I buy online is paid in dollars.) The only reason MS can do this and get away with it is that they currently are the only company offering cheap and easy access to the console market.

In my opinion MS should do one of the following: a) Let everyone pay in dollars, or b) Automaticly convert dollars to currency x based on the correct conversion rate at the time of sale. Both solutions are comonly used, even by small companies and service providers so it can't be that difficult. But of course, then MS would miss out on a bit of extra dough from european developers. (Millions upon millions, I imagine...)

Lastly I can't help but to comment on Stephen's post where he says that "The prices in each region were set about equal *when we set them*. The global economy has changed since then, and we're not adjusting prices to match the relative strength of any one country's economy.". Well, I'm not an economy expert but isn't *not* adjusting currency conversion rates according to the economy a way of adjusting prices to match the relative strenght of any one country's economy? (Since the effect of not adjusting conversion rates is that "strong" economies pay more, i.e. it's a way of turning up the price of the product in these markets)

We have an FAQ on this: http://forums.xna.com/forums/t/12661.aspx. And as per the FAQ, this thread is now locked.