Kinect: The fast-selling gadget in the world

Kinect is the new title-holder for fastest-selling consumer electronics device in the world, the team at Guinness Book of World Records confirmed today.

Kinect, a motion-sensing peripheral for the Xbox 360, has been officially dubbed the fastest-selling consumer electronics device in the world. According to Microsoft, consumers purchased an average of 133,333 Kinect units a day between Nov. 4 – when the Kinect first launched – and Jan. 3 of this year. That adds up to 8 million Kinect peripherals sold in 60 days. Meanwhile, to date, 10 million Kinect units have been unloaded, Microsoft says.

"The sales figures here speak for themselves," Gaz Deaves of Guinness World Records said in a press statement released today. "According to independent research, no other consumer electronics device sold faster within a 60-day time span, which is an incredible achievement considering the strength of the sector." As Mashable points out, it took Nintendo a full 2 years before the Wii reached the 10 million unit mark – so yes, Kinect is doing pretty well.

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The Kinect and the Sony Move peripheral arrived at a crucial time for the video game industry, which has weathered a serious sales slump in recent months. Hardware sales are down, accessory sales are down, and game sales are down. Many analysts viewed the Kinect in particular as a much needed boost to the gaming market – a device that would help invigorate interest in the aging Xbox 360 platform.

And the Kinect was received with open arms from many reviewers.

The device, wrote one critic, "is an absolute pleasure to have in the home. Much more importantly, it's a reliable one. Within an hour of messing about with the Kinect Dashboard, any nagging question marks over lag and unresponsiveness are snuffed out. Your on-screen hand icon matches your real-life movements near-perfectly, whilst the voice commands.... are an absolute revelation."

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