Microsoft's model comprises both the subscriber fee and digital content bits, and it's unclear whether Mattick's summer 2008 $1 billion revenue claim was strictly Xbox Live subscriber fees, or intended to aggregate both.

Who's winning? Who knows. All we're allowed is a carefully massaged, contextually ambiguous glimpse of the sanctum sanctorum, and even the latest cat loosed from Microsoft's bag is probably notable less for what it reveals about the company's service than what it doesn't.

Matt Peckham agrees with Gregg Easterbrook, who wrote "Torture numbers, and they'll confess to anything." He's strapping integers to waterboards at .