Currently Online 
I had a conversation with someone (can't remember who, apologies) here about the whole thing about why M$ were in this and why they wanted Sony out (although seemingly didn't mind Nintendo whiping the floor with them).
In the end the conclusion was a few things but mainly that they wanted the PC to be the centre of the living room, while Sony wanted the TV/Media devices. Thing is M$ will fail at that because their attempt at a PC in the living room was the X-box and that was more media then PC. PS2 and X-box had similar pluses. Both had DVD players etc, in the end the PS2 won, not only on price but because of brand, games (both causal and hardcore) and it's general use in the living room (DVD etc). Xbox was too late and far too shooty.
Come this new generation M$ had a head start so have done well with that but with my conversation in the other thread, we came to it that M$ were trying to secure the media centre via downloads while PS3 was still a disc format. To be honest, i think downloads is a bad option at the moment. Yes it's the way forward, but I'd still prefer to have a CD then some completely unphysical and my net connection is not win all, neither is majority of the worlds, people with download limits are screwed as well as slow connections, but a disc is a disc. But it's M$ drive to be that Media centre in the living room that makes them want to win against Sony, nigh on ignoring Nintendo.
Of course, personally, I feel a PC has no place in the living room. It goes in the corner on a desk and is used for work, FPS and porn.
Hmm, pie.
