| crumas2 said: Almost forgot... Promised/ rumored price drops affect the competition as some consumers who were preparing to "settle" for the cheaper system will now hold off purchasing in the hope their preferred system will be more affordable. |
Except, with the nature of the rumours I don't think this is a likely situation ... Regardless of whether it is a good thing or not, people (on the whole) dislike buying something that is unpopular. Even rebels in our society tend to conform to a fairly popular and well established style of rebellion.
If the PS3’s price cut rumours where phrased "The PS3 is so popular and has sold so well that economies of scale have reduced the manufacturing cost and an unprecedented rate and we expect the PS3 to see a price reduction in the near future" I could see the rumour having the impact you expect. Unfortunately, the price cut rumours are closer to "The PS3 is amazingly unpopular and Sony is in trouble. If they don’t reduce the price of the PS3 immediately they will have to stop manufacturing the system"
