In a recent interview Marc Whitten the general manager of Xbox Live caught up with venturebeat.

VB:  There were stories that talked about how Microsoft knocked out alot of modders from Xbox Live.  I recall that early on there were maybe 1 or 2 percent of the people who were using modded machines.  Why would there be esuch a large number now? One report said it was a million modders knocked out.

MW:  ” It’s a cat and mouse game.  These were people that were pirating software.  We try to keep sanctity of life from a safety and anti-cheating perspective and we protect our partners.  We didn’t release the number. I cannot explain to you why people would think it was a million people. It wasn’t a million people. Check the veracity of that claim. It was one news source. I think we do a really good job understanding what people are doing on the system. That applies to intellectual property (piracy) and how we treat the community in terms of harassment. We are committed to making it better and better.”

Why would this be such a large number now?  Well thats a real hard question Venture Beat?   I don’t know maybe it’s the global financial meltdown that keeps 15-20% of the real workforce unemployed, or maybe its the number of crappy overpriced titles that come out so often , or maybe just maybe people are getting tired of getting #%$ed in the #$$ at Gamestop.  Who knows, but they had a good run.