It feels strange because we know for a fact that there's that mid-gen refresh from the court documentation. The "adorably all digital" thing. If they are planning on changing the page to include that console as well, I guess it would make sense to distinguish it to "console(S)" plural. But then again, wouldn't they simply wait until the hardware's officially announced and only THEN change the branding?
I think if that were the case, they'd just phrase it as "Xbox consoles". As in, there is little reason to get rid of the branding altogether unless things have significantly changed with plans BTS.
If plans regarding Xbox platforms for branding remained the same, but the games are targeting all consoles going forward, they could've just listed all the consoles and/or their brands. But I've been thinking more about what some people have said, WRT Sony and Nintendo not wanting to play ball with a Microsoft multiplatform policy that essentially uses their platforms as an advertising bed to siphon users over to Xbox console platforms. All the 30% cuts in the world don't make sense if you've got what's still a direct competitor, putting all their games on your platform while trying to sell your customers on Day 1 Game Pass (or Game Pass in general), a service only on Microsoft platforms console-wise. Why grant a developer license to a company looking to do that?
I don't think this means no new releases are coming to Xbox Series S & X; 1P-wise they'll still get all the current games in the pipeline. But I don't think Day 1 Game Pass is a guarantee anymore for any of them, and Microsoft might also stop manufacturing new Series consoles (they will probably still have new gaming hardware though but probably under different branding and a very different business model). These changes probably also make it a lot more likely they can offer Game Pass on Sony & Nintendo consoles, but it'll be a lot more like say EA Play. Maybe instead of Day 1, you get timed trails for new releases with larger trial periods depending on your subscription tier?
In terms of competitiveness, this is likely the end for the Series consoles, and Xbox consoles in general. Hardware-wise they should be a lot more interested in the growing gaming-centric PC devices market. But there won't be anything releasing from that for at least another two years. I just hope they don't half-ass it; a really high-quality, gaming-optimized semi-consolized PC NUC product line running Windows with an Xbox-like console GUI frontend, semi-custom (a standardized spec with some scalability that can be refreshed every few years and baseline-wise tries matching what an equivalent console would be doing that gen TDP/power/tech-wise) and with some neat form factors in different device types, licensable by OEMs like the Surface products, could be a really good buy.
If they just let any random Intel/Nvidia/AMD chips and stuff get slapped together in a box and drop the Xbox branding on it (which doesn't even make sense if they're getting away from that branding), or only give it as much effort as the Steam Machines, then it'll get nowhere.