You have some true argument there. Other thing I find that your being a bit extremistic. For Sony and PS3 to be where they are right now, their brand name is far from suffering. They still have a long way to go with HDTV and blu ray just gaining ground on the market. Their console still being price at 299$. The fact Microsoft gained more recognition and that Sony is selling less of a higher cost console doesnt mean Sony's branding and reputation is suffering.

Ouch! Those numbers don't lie. Except the dates you pick to use make a big difference. 

If you plug November 5, 2005 into VGchartz, your starting well before the slower Japan sales start date for the PS3, and not the North American debut. Even that is skewed since your giving 6 days extra sales to the 360 count,the PS3 wasn't selling in ANYWHERE until the 11th (in Japan only). .

Interestingly, if you choose:

VGChartz Hardware data for the period 19th Nov 2006 to 07th Aug 2010:

But that's 3 days before the USA  release date of the PS3, which gives 3 days extra sales to 360.

But if you choose:

VGChartz Hardware data for the period 26th Nov 2006 to 07th Aug 2010:

Which is 4 days after the release date of the PS3.

Anyway, I apologize for the inaccurate OP title, should have rephrased it to "The PS3 is selling better than the 360", or something similar. Unfortunately you can't go back and change the title. And it looks to be like it's just to close to call anyway. To get the true exact numbers you'd have to use more resolution and look at daily sales, not weekly, and there would still be some fuzziness involved since there's different release dates for different areas.

BUT, which system will ultimately will win the' race', even with 360's 1 year head start? The PS3, of course! Why, do you ask? When I look at my Ps3, I see a game console, AND a blu-ray player. Five years from now, i'll STILL NEED TO OWN a blu-ray player, and for consumers wanting to buy a blu-ray player and game console, the PS3 option will still be there.. When they release a 720 however, what's going to happen to 360 sales??? (hint: what happened to xbox1 sales?)

p.s. and for those of you who just don't get the whole point of this discussion (oh, just look at the numbers sold, 360 wins, see!), well just go watch some cartoons or something.

For reference the release dates (According to the wiki's) ,

"The PlayStation 3 was first released on November 11, 2006 in Japan,^[12] November 17, 2006 in North America,^[13] March 16, 2007 in the United Kingdom and Ireland and March 23, 2007 in mainland Europeand Oceania.^[14][15] "

the 360 was released on November 22, 2005 in the states:

I don't lack anything of the sort. Instead, I think the point is irrelivant. I was speaking of the overall.

How important is America, btw, in terms of game sales and developers? I see tons of Japanese developers spending tens of millions of dollars and actually changing the core mechanics of their long standing series' trying to appeal to American audiences, like Final Fantasy...but I don't think Mass Effect is going turn based anytime soon?

Fact is, the Japanese gaming market is declining this generation, and the American market has come to power as the dominant marketplace in the world. Not only does this market garner tremendous game and console sales for a single country, it also influences developers to a greater extent than ever before. Not to mention the videogame franchises related to North America. It is arguably much harder to break into the traditionalist Japanese market and have a breakout hit, than it is to create a multimillion selling franchise in America, because we buy more shit, and we are not traditionalists on the whole.

Just look at the influence the American marketplace can bring things like The Wii. Oprah is not from Turkey.

My point is, yes, most of MS's success and Sony's failure has taken place in the Americas this generation. The paradigm shift has started here. However, the United States is now the healthiest market and argubly the most influential country for modern console and PC gaming, and that is a major reason for the rise of the Xbox and the fall of the Playstation. Where are your biggest videogame companies developing product? Who are they trying to appeal to? Which games sell the most copies? The influence of the American marketplace is most keenly felt in Others, which is to say mostly everywhere in the world but the Americas and Japan.

Furthermore, the Playstation brand has not just taken its hits from the Xbox. Even in Japan, the Wii has taken up a large share of the gaming market from the Playstation brand as well as in others and America. That is where your argument fails. If I was JUST talking about HD consoles, then you might be able to marginalize this generations failure of the playstation brand to America, but the Wii exists, and has caused the Playstation pie to shrink to miniscule proportions(compared to last gen) even in countries who historically would be downright daffy about the brand.

In any case, nitpicking country to country is just another excuse. If you are trying to pretend that the Playstation brand is in anywhere nearly as good of a position as it was before the Playstation 3 launched, then you are insulting my intelligence. Sony went from utter, undeniable, DS like dominance of the entire industry to last place within the span of a year, and years later they have still not recovered in any area, and they probably never well. They lost their advantage, and it would take a miracle to regain such a hughly dominant brand name in today's industry climate. The cards have all been played.

I'm only taking about the Playstation brand, not the Sony brand, and I'm only comparing their playstation brand this generation to the Playstation brand of last generation under the PS2.

Under those conditions, it is suffering, has suffered, and will continue to suffer until it attains total dominance. The brand went from a supermajority to 3rd place out of 3, and it does not matter what the price is, or when it was launched. Those things are business tactics used by Sony, with the probable intent of putting short term profit ahead of their brand popularity, which they are forced to do because of their own financial hardships.

The "why" does not change the "what." When we start pointing to the "why" instead of taking responsibility for the "what" we're straying from the facts. Particularly when in this case, Sony actually caused the "why" on purpose through a """"""business strategy"""""" and I can't put enough quotations around that term when I relate it to the PS3, because VGChartz doesn't allow posts that long.

1. Let's launch it a year after everybody else.

2. Let's charge half a grand for it.

3. Let's make it big and bulky, because the Japanese HATE that shit.

4. Let's not have many good games ready for launch, or for the whole first year.

5. Let's stop paying 3rd parties to keep their games exclusive to our console.

6. Let's market it shittily, through ineptness.

7. Let's act snoody about the prices, and overconfident about our sales potential.

8. Let's remove backwards compatibility to make people buy PS3 games.

9. Let's go from first place to dead last place, but no matter what, don't change the strategy until the board members fire our asses and hire a new management team.

10. Let's launch late again next generation, and announce the fact that we plan to do just that, proudly, as if it were a positive.

""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""BUSINESS STRATEGY"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""

From a company's point of view the PS3 is acctually winning, compared to the 360 the ratio of HW sales every year is higher than 360 and this is significant when software companies decide what games to make and for what system.

Those saying that the PS3 will not be supported at least a year longer than the 360 are wrong. Just look at the facts. Xbox was quickly killed and PS2 is still supported. Also, the 360 is limited with DVD and PS3's blu-ray space will help it stay in the next generation.

We arent talking of the same thing here. A branding isnt related to an amount of sell, its the identity of the product, how consumers perceive you. The playstation brand isnt suffering. They are selling less for other reason then their name. It even because of the great branding they have they are where they are at the moment.

Hah, man your intense! I'm not sure how to respond to this rant. So I won't! Oh what the hell.

Bullshit! (LOL) It WAS a headstart, the 360 came out a year before the PS3, LOOK AT THE RELEASE DATES. You can't say (something) has sold more than (something), when the first something had started selling a year before the other, that's ridiculous. 

Oh, that was business strategy you say? I think it probably had to more to do with whether the design phase of the console's were completed, ya think? 

Still a little fuzzy? The 360 has been on sale 25% longer, so  IT BETTER have more total sales. IF YOU STILL DON'T GET IT, lets view it as 2 separate races, or better yet time trials, each on their own separate racetrack, the 360 has done 4.7 laps on it's track, the Ps3 has done 3.7 laps. (aprox) NOW LETS COMPARE AT LAP 3.7 FOR BOTH 360 AND PS3, SHALL WE?

VGChartz Hardware data for the period 05th Nov 2006 to 07th Aug 2010:

Now lets look at the 360 sales FOR THE SAME AMOUNT OF TIME, starting when it was released:

VGChartz Hardware data for the period 20th Nov 2005 to 22nd Aug 2009:

So what does this mean? You can even use the LAST 3.7 years of 360's sales instead of it's first, and you'll get:

VGChartz Hardware data for the period 19th Nov 2006 to 07th Aug 2010:

And 360 still barely looses, but it's not a fair comparison, we should stick with the first 3.7 years of each console, because it looks better from my point of view (smile). These ARE real numbers.

Sigh......... Stop comparing the PS3 to the PS2. The only thing they have in common is the word Playstation. The PS2 was the most dominant console in history. The PS3 is in third place. The reason MS stopped production of the Xbox was to focus totally on the 360 and get their foot in the door in the gaming market. Obviously their strategy worked because they are ahead of Sony this gen. And just because the PS3 uses BluRay does not mean it will compete with next gen's consoles. The consoles of next gen will be just as big a leap as last gen to this. The PS3's hardware will pale in comparison to the next Xbox console.

Then I guess the PS2 has not sold more than the 360 and Wii since it came out before them. Thanks for clearing that up.

In that case you can compare console sales to regular cell phone sales. You can play games with almost all cell phones in the world. Around 90% of the PC's are never used to play games so I don't think PC's are comparable to consoles.