What the Xbox secrets leak tell us about the console business | The DeanBeat

Posted byby Dean Takahashi
September 22, 2023
Updated June 18, 2025
6 min

Microsoft had a monumental leak of some of its most sensitive plans this week, as reported by The Verge’s Tom Warren. It was all thanks to someone at Microsoft who didn’t properly upload redacted documents to the Federal Trade Commission. I’ve been thinking about what this means.

And now last night, the United Kingdom’s antitrust regulators gave preliminary approval for Microsoft’s $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard. Approval can come in a few weeks, after feedback.

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Written by

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.