mutantsushi on 27 December 2013
I believe that there is laws/regulations/taxes that require consumer electronic devices to have low power standby modes, for energy efficiency/ecological concerns. Even if it's not good for anything else, it means that people who forget to or are too lazy to turn off their console will use less power for all the hours and days it is turned on but not being used, compared to if there was no low power standby mode.
