Sony CEO Kenichiro Yoshida calls console gaming niche

[mjk45]

pokoko said:

mjk45 said:

You could mount an argument for just about anything  being niche, if you hold it up against the world's population, like Rol stated consoles make up 25% of gaming and in terms of per person spending that would most likely be higher again, i can see where Yoshida's coming from he's looking for potential growth and that's fine but using niche to describe console gaming is the wrong use of the word, it makes it seem like it is a marginal business and if so where does it leave Sony and the other sectors of the business would he call them niche since that niche games division was a strong factor in their turn around.

This is the CEO of Sony talking to investors who are looking at the big picture, he's not posting on a gaming forum.  There were like 1.5 BILLION smartphones sold last year.  Physical consoles are a small market that will probably get comparatively smaller over time.

I'm not sure why people would argue over the nuances of the word "niche," either--isn't this a translation from Japanese?  

We can talk about the translation but until someone gives us a different translation it's what we have, he was referencing console gaming when he called it niche when the facts don't back that up. it's plain that this is Sony positioning themselves to be a part of the technological future that includes streaming and AI ,and I can't see anyone with any sense of foresight not agreeing with this venture, obviously he was trying to demonstrate that the deal was bigger than just the gaming side ,What he should have said is this venture and the growth we expect to emerge from it cut's across many divisions besides Gaming like Imaging, Movies and TV  to name a few and confining the discourse to just the gaming division misses that point. Instead of doing that and just playing up the deals scope he had enough insecurity to feel that he had to sell it at the expense of publicly questioning his companies policies concerning subscription models.

Last edited by mjk45 - on 23 May 2019