I honestly think it's impossible for even SONY to get an exact number.  Whether some people already have an Eye or it's their first time buying it, how do they know who's buying it for what?

Because those are the numbers that matter to their shareholders, Sony makes money from selling to retailers, not consumers directly

Then why doesnt Microsoft do it?

These constant shipped numbers from Sony are nothing but an attempt at PR. However if I was Microsoft I would start always using ship figures also to to combat this. This is comparing Apples and Oranges.

Because Sony didn't have a tracking company like Nintendo to estimate sales to consumer.

Just retail knows how much sold to consumers.

MS and Sony know just how much sold to retail.

Exactly! They don't want 'us' to know anything, they don't care what we know about these sales..Retailers and shareholders must be really happy with these numbers

they just want us to know about the games, and they will keep supporting this I'm sure

Microsoft, Activision, and Nintendo  among others seem to have no problem estimating end user sales...when Activision recently gave Black Ops figures it was sold through, not shipped, for example.

Sony gives the shipped number because it's bigger and more impressive. Duh.

Microsoft doesn't do that... just Nintend had a tracking company for thi purpose.

Sold to consumers from Microsoft = Sold to retail (their consumers) .

so hell! the 2,5 million kinect are shipped? sold to customers? if so, how MS knows that...

Excuse me, but you haven't addressed the lack of accuracy in knowing the intent of purchasing a PlayStation Eye.  That's where the problem is.  Please do not be disrespectful.

Keyword estimating, maybe Sony just likes to be accurate and doesn't want to release a guess as a fact