Today, Microsoft announced that "by extending the capabilities of the Xbox platform with Kinect and Xbox LIVE, Microsoft has 'changed the tail' of the typical console lifecycle, showing dramatic gains in the fifth and sixth years of this generation." In addition, they’ve released the following data points:

• Microsoft has now sold 55 million Xbox 360 consoles across 38 countries and sales are accelerating.
• Xbox 360 maintains its lead in the U.S. as the top selling console in 2011, and ten of the past eleven months.
• In the first four months of 2011, Xbox 360 has seen a 29 percent year over year increase in sales, which is more than triple the growth of PlayStation 3 and the largest growth of any console on the market.
• There are now nearly 35 million active Xbox LIVE members worldwide spending an average of almost 60 hours a month on the service.
  Cumulatively Xbox LIVE members are now logging 2.1 billion entertainment hours a month.

US: Normalized Hardware Sales from NPD to June 2011
Of course, it's important to keep in mind that these are just US figures and the Wii is still ahead in overall sales and will likely remain so for the remainder of this generation. Sony also has a stronger PS3 presence in Europe and Japan (and in Japan in particular, the Xbox 360 is merely a sales blip). Nevertheless, these are impressive figures for Microsoft and due in no small part to the success of the Kinect add-on. Did I mention we have an Xbox 360 book coming out in October? Let's hope this upward trend continues... ;-)