About

Larry Hryb, the gamer formerly known as Xbox’s Major Nelson.

I help companies tell their story to the people who use what they make. I learned it in radio and put it to work for 28 years at Microsoft (six as a vendor, then 22 full time), where I helped modernize how the company talks to the world. I’m still at it.

right now

• I’m hosting Xbox FanFest events as Xbox turns 25, back in front of the community that has been with me since Xbox Live launched.
• I’m Community Development Advisor at Commodore, helping the team behind the revived brand grow a fan community that has kept it alive for more than thirty years.
• I’m on the advisory board for MidWest Games.
• I speak, advise and consult on communications, culture at scale, and community. Three talks people ask for:
  • How We Did It: The Microsoft & Xbox Playbook
  • Community as Product: Building Trust at Scale
  • Crisis Communications: The Playbook Nobody Wants to Use

If you’re planning an event, an offsite or a hard conversation with your customers, say hello.

kind words

Through blogs, podcasts, social media, and events, Larry pioneered direct communication with players long before that kind of engagement became standard across the industry.

Peri Fractic, President and CEO, Commodore, March 2026

Larry, it has been awesome to work alongside you on this journey. Thank you for being a friend, and for everything you’ve done for our Xbox community and team.

Phil Spencer, then head of Xbox, July 2023

…from at least the mid-2000s to the mid-2010s, Major Nelson was practically synonymous with the platform.

Engadget, 2023

the long version

For six years I worked in radio by day and on MSN at night as a Microsoft vendor, and I helped ship Windows 95. I left radio in 2000, moved to Seattle, and joined Microsoft full time in January 2001 as editor in chief of MSN Music. In 2003 I moved to Xbox as a senior project manager. I worked with engineering on Achievements, Party Chat, Cloud Saves and messaging, and I was on the Emmy award winning team behind Xbox Live. The 360 sold 84 million units.

In 2012 I moved into corporate communications to help modernize how Microsoft tells its story. I worked with leadership, product, engineering and legal to explain what we were building, through launches, big changes and a few bad days, and I kept talking straight to players while we did it. I left in September 2023.

I launched and hosted one of Microsoft’s first Podcasts in 2005 (Major Nelson Radio, that became the Xbox Podcast) that has inspired a generation of gamers and content creators. You can see the podcast archive and a selection of my video work on my YouTube channel. Don’t miss my PAX Keynote about how I got into the industry, and tips for how you can too. I also have a Wikipedia page (which is mostly accurate; it’s bad form to edit your own page).

From June 2024 to December 2025 I led Advocacy and Community at Unity, working with game developers while the platform was changing. That’s me on stage at Unite 2024 below.

I spent about a decade in radio in Hartford, running communications, marketing and promotions for a five-station cluster. I studied television, radio and film production at Syracuse University’s Newhouse School. I’m a storyteller at heart.

On stage at the Unite 2024 keynote, presenting to hundreds of game developers and industry members.

Say hello: email me