Apples iPod dissagrees with your statement. If you ask me that there's nothing "wrong" with the SONY psp, it just does too many things that other products already do. The DS is different, it's an innovative look at the casual market, LOADED with games (not necesarilly good mind you) that you can pick-up and fiddle with for 5 mins to 3 hours. Nintendo targeted CASUAL audiences, smaller games, almost no load times, creative uses for the stylus. Sony targeted people like me who wanted a jack of all trades and a more "hard core" audience, they ASSUMED that since the PS2 took off like a bat out of hell, that the casual market must be the same. "Oops", is what I'd say. 

However, many justified the original Xbox as Microsofts "foot in the door", if the PSP is Sony's entry into the handheld market then I'll assume they got more than half there body in. Calling the PSP a failure is a commonly used disaster of a mistake, the PSP continues to make money and continues to sell hardware. Who cares if it's not as much as the DS?  

 Ok, ill rephrase what i said... id like to let it be known that i mean the PS3 has very few good games.

 The whole point of my argument anyway is that while you do get people who buy these consoles for their games solely, you do get people (such as yourself) that buys them primarily for their multimedia features, the fact that it is a game machine is just a bonus to some people. You also get people who buy them just for their multimedia features. This does hurt games sales, and you can see this when you look at how well the games are selling; only 11 games have sold over a million on the PSP, and if you look at last weeks sales in the UK, only one game was in the top 40 (if i remember correctly, sorry if i am wrong). Ofc, the PSP is doing much better in places such as Japan, but the DS is still topping it.

Most of the profit is in software. In some cases like the PS3, all the profit is 100% in software since the hardware sells at a loss. If a system cannot sell software, then it will be a failure. Whether it has to do with buying habits or lack of installed base, it doesn't matter.

I have not used the word failure.  I am saying the market isn't responding as well to Sony's offering as Nintendo's which is blatantly obvious.  Neither the PSP's multimedia functionality nor its gaming functionality is a match for the DS in today's market.

 So is that why, when I buy a game for the DS and therefore don't have the money anymore to go buy something for my PC or Wii, I still end up buying something for one of the two anyhow?

 Gamers do still have to make decisions whether to buy a DS (system/game) or a PS3/Wii/360 (system/game). The DS reaches a much broader audience than those three do, but that doesn't mean it's a different market. It's the exact same market.

The DS offers absolutely fantastic gameplay that ISN'T just "fun on the run" (like most GB/GBC/GBA stuff historically was), but it still CAN BE "fun on the run" (y'know, stuff you play while traveling and whatnot), and it's a lot cheaper (for the cost of buying a Wii, you can get a DS with as much as five new first-party games... and don't get me started on PS3/360). As a result, of course it'll outsell them. And the best part? It's still bringing in more money, too, despite the much lower pricepoint.

 I'm not sure I would have gone with the term "Nobody gives a @#$%", when I think of that phrase, I think of the Zune vs. the iPod, the Philips CD-I vs EVERTHING. Obviously people ARE interested, it's still selling, it's just not selling AS WELL as the DS, which is a good thing for Nintendo, not necesarrily a bad thing for SONY seeing as how they're still making money and still selling units.

This isn't a necessity for SONY, this is just another market to make money in, and as long as their doing that their fine, as far as I know they haven't lost any 3rd party support, so obviously people still want to make games for it :P I don't see a problem. 

Now I'll agree with Fishy that most of the money comes from software, and in this case they would like the PS2 and PSP to support the losses, but the PS3 won't be losing money forever, I don't know how SONY pulls there crap off but they've been in the hardware business for a long time, I have a feeling they'll be ok.  

Making money is a good short term financial goal. 

Gaining market share is a very good long term strategic goal. 

Sony could very well succeed in one goal and fail in another.  Success in both makes the future look much brighter though.

 Very true, Ninty's doing quite well considering they're playing both at the moment ;) But I won't lose faith in SONY, they haven't dissapointed me yet :D

Off topic: 9 layers of quotes containing several paragraphs each? Replace all but the last few layers with an ellipsis to save space. Interested parties can go back and look at your conversation if they want.

Yes, the DS continues to dominate, but is Nintendo making any more money than they did with the GB/GBA? They have a smaller install base and much more expensive hardware to produce than then.

 Aww Game_boy this is part of the fun :( You should have joined us ^_^