I think it could be a lot of fun.  I'd much rather be in the room of a press conference before I watch it on youtube.  Being able to show live demos on home would be nice, but I don't know if they will support that anyway.

 As for being a a game lobby...I learned to type playing Diablo 1 on battle.net because I joined a clan and had to learn to type faster to communicate with people.  A lot of people ended up hardly ever playing games just chatting and recruiting other people.  Having a persistance place to meet is a great way to communicate, and that press conference demonstrating home specifically mention clans.  THAT is a huge MMO feature and that's a great thing to add.  I know resistance had clans but actually having a place where everyone could go and meet up outside the game is a great idea.  It helps keep everyone connected.

 Believe it or not, chat rooms are very popular.  Virtual worlds that serve as trophy rooms, movie theaters, demo watching, and clan meetings are even better, to me.

 Also, I want to point out again, in response to shams, that if you don't want to walk around the world there is a menu that easily gets you to where you want to go.  If you are looking at the PS3 menu, I'm sure there will be an option to go straight to the trophy room or whatever.  What I'd like to see is PSP features worked in instead of just a PSP menu.

PS to shams:  Oblivion, while giving player the option to do a lot of things, has a set of quests that are very linear if you just want to follow the storyline.  I know games like these get reputations for being very non-linear but in the end there is only so much you can do and usually there is always a linear storyline.  Zelda allows exploration, as do Final Fantasy games, where you can unlock secrets and complete sidequests.  The only difference with Oblivion is that those side quests take a little longer.  As far as I know it doesn't change the main storyline, but I can't confirm that yet as I haven't completed it.  I don't know why having more optional things to do in a game would ever be a bad thing, though.  (Sorry for the long PS).   

 Just curious why you differentiate the PS3 and Home from "the internet."  I suppose you mean browsers?  You can use the PS3 as a fully-functional computer so I'm not seeing the difference.  I don't understand why some of you want a PC to only do typical PC things and a PS3 to only play games.  A lot of people could use the PS3 as their main PC if they have a HD output (which could be a CRT monitor and not just HDTV).  Full linux OS, any hard drive could be used, USB and/or bluetooth keyboards, mice, and webcams, HD output (which, again, includes CRTs 5 years ago or so), 7.1 sound, fast processor.  Sounds like a PC that can play PS3 games and watch blu-ray movies.

i dont' know. i just like doing computer stuff at my desk and game stuff on my tv. i dont like the mix the two.  for one thing, i dont like "integrated systems" (ironic since i do systems engineer). i like a cell phone for a cell phone. i dont care if it plays mp3s or take pictures.  i'll pay for something i need. but if i dont need it, i dont want to pay the premium for it just because "it's included as a bundle". but then again, it's just personal preference.

*sigh*. Maybe you should watch the full video on it instead of just that first minute. You can watch full length movies from Home with a group of friends. You can move around that TV and put it anywhere you want. And yes, watching videos and hopefully being able to download more demos of games will be great. That can already be done from the playstation store but having incentive to stream it to Home won't hurt. Won't take up HD space then.

If Sony makes some money from what other people put on it, I'm sure it will be less than what Microsoft is sucking out of people for paying $50 a year just to play online games.  To play ANYONE'S game on Live, you have to pay Microsoft.  What's the difference?

Of course developers will make money on it. Trophies, trailers, demos, content to put in your Home will all motivate someone to play games, just like achievements on live. Having it in a 3D world that you can customize makes it that much better. Home is A LOT of things and you keep attacking certain aspects of it but there is a lot to the 12 minute video you might want to actually watch before commenting further.

 Fair enough, and I understand your viewpoint.  I haven't installed Linux yet on my PS3 but I'm hoping to rip and encode things faster on it when I do.  My PC is getting old and I can't use it as the multi-function game-playing machine that I used to.  Instead of upgrading my PC I think I'll just transition more to the PS3

See...I really don't see the appeal of watching full-length movies on a little fake tv that you can move around, when I'd rather just watch that same movie with my friends in real life, on a regular size tv.

YAY I can watch a movie on a fake tv on my tv... how fun!

Seriously though, some of the ideas are great, and I'm sure it will catch on, Sony are onto something good with HOME most certainly.

It's definitely not for me, not one iota, though I'll probably still use it if I ever get a PS3 and go online with it, but honestly, I kinda doubt it.

EDIT - Ben, great minds think alike >_<

.... did you watch the home presentation....  ?

 stuff you watch will take most of you real actuall tv.... its called Zoom in LOL.

LOL but why the heck would you want to watch a movie on most of your screen when you could watch it on all of your screen, with optimum quality and sound...no other onscreen distractions...LOL

If I can watch my own videos and listen to my own music by streaming them over the network from my PC, then I might have some uses for it. It would also be mandatory for me to be able to design and use my own artwork in my establishment. (ANIME/MANGA FTW!)

But this is SONY were talking about here. It'll be a cold day in hell before they let us use our own media recordings without rebuying it from them first. They've already admitted to not supporting media codecs outside of their own. I'm not even talking about illegal content, I'm saying even things like MP3's you bought off of iTunes or your own home video recordings.

 They're going to pull the same tricks as the PSP and limit user access to content and setup, that's a safe bet and will constrict any support from the community that HOME could get.

Edit : Because if they don't, Sony's Music and Movie divisions would probably file a lawsuit against the gaming division. Wouldn't be the first time that one part of Sony sues another....