makingmusic476 on 24 December 2010
A poster on neogaf has directly translated the original Japanese interview, and has clarified what Hirai was trying to say somewhat. He's not saying that PSN in its current form is unprofitable, but rather that due to the continued expansion of the wider Sony Online Network through services like the PSN video store, Qriocity, etc., they are still in the red.
Some excerpts from UntoldDreams' posts:
| Umm... Hold the horses this is inaccurate. http://jp.reuters.com/article/compan...49554820101222 The actual Japanese article indicates the online service structure including their music play for QRIOCITY as well as E-Book and no doubt anything digital was not making money YET. That includes the video store. They use the term PSN as the amalgram of their entire online digital play. That as an aggregate cost assessment and has not yet yielded profit due to the simple fact that its still being built. This is NOT a quote from Kaz Hirai saying PSN games are not profitable. That's completely out of context for the article. |
| The context of the article is stating that due to all the expansion they have put into PSN including their Video, Music, Games, E-book... They have yet to be profitable. Anything else being said is not relevant to the original article and statement by Kaz. |
| What the original Japanese article is talking about is that the Sony Online Infrastructure is costing a lot of money to phase into existence (music, video, games, ebooks) and that keeps them in the red. Its not specific to PSN gaming or dedicated servers or fighting with LIVE or anything like that. The article also says they have an 11 year road map to their (world domination) profitable digital future (Sony Online Network). Every stage of their business plan starts in the RED INK due to spin up costs and you can imagine how much it will cost for them to fight it out with iTunes and other digital companies. |
