Really, the success of the Playstation was because it launched at the perfect time with a proven format (cd's). The marketing campaign for the PS1 was shit: remember that purple polygon head? With Sega's history for burning it's fans, and the Project Reality/Ultra 64/Nintendo 64 nowhere in sight, it was time for a new king.
By far, what has hurt Sony the most is their need to shoe-horn everything except amazing games into their VIDEO GAME SYSTEMS. Using their powerful Playstation brand to force UMD and Blu-Ray down consumers throats is a bad idea. Techno junkies eat this stuff up. The main stream don't care. Hardly anyone I know used a PS2 to watch DVDs after the first year. Nobody uses a PSP to browse online.
If Sony puts the focus back on games, they can be #1 again. As it stands, to paraphrase an old PS catch phrase; Sony, "U r not (red) e".
Enos will live again.
