Kind of goes back to Google's decision to buy youtube.com. I have heard a few alarming statements about youtube and it costing google roughly 1 million in bandwidth a day. That is an extreamly high recurring cost and maybe its current business model does not make enough money on it to offset that cost, but everyone realizes the siginficance of youtube in our world today so they would be stupid to let it go just cause its not profitable now.
Same thing with console makers and taking a loss at first in order to sell software at a profit. I'd think that Sony is doing ok with PSN, its a great service to attract people who havent decided on a console yet. It's an easy marketing bullet point that can differentiate between their closest competitor. That said, the model will most likely change. I think they are saving up some "features" to offer to PSN members that want more out of the service. Maybe its discounted rentals, cross game voice chat, or something we havent heard of, but I wouldnt be suprised if they offer a different service that requires a subscription fee. We've all heard the rumors, but we havent seen anything substantial yet. I think their only real mistake would be if they took away services that are currently free (ie multiplayer support), and started charging. I think the balance would lie in building a big enough package of compelling features that make people feel its worth while. Once they have that design, we'll see an announcement.
