have never paid more then 29.99 for a year of xblive. i guess it might be more in the future, but im sure ill still find good deals at new egg. after 8 years i can say its been worth it, its the network my friends are on and we can catch up even as dispersed across the country as we are now, and its a network far less prone to cheating then the PC world... ive used PSN over my psp and have been happy with it, but its never been enough to get me out of xblive

here is something i dont understand why cant with either of these services we rent a movie on  the service and invite friends into a chat and watch it with them, maybe show avatars and what not off MST3k style

I find it interesting that Sony has been in the red with PSN, but people here then say Microsoft MUST not charge online, because Sony doesn't.  Microsoft is making money and people are up to pay for it, so why not charge?  Do people think Playstation Plus would exist if Sony didn't want some way to get what Microsoft has going on now?

Haters will always hate. 

I am just happy I don't have to pay for online. I do not play online often as I still enjoy single player games however I do play a few rounds of Winning Eleven whenever I am bored with master league

except sony still doesnt force ppl to pay just to use their online service DESPITE them lossing money in this department.

Not really, first you have to purchase them, which most are PS3s but still, then you have to rack them, program them, and maintain them which costs manpower, then you have to pay for electric costs for the servers and A/Ced room kept at 60F.

Not that cheap when you are constantly adding more.

ps3 hardware is profitable

PSN too is profitable but because they are continually expanding it,they need more time to break even as new services like qriocity need some customers which will come with time to become profitable

OT

love you sony,love the word free

Home has 17 million users making it more popular than World of Warcraft so it must be making tons of money.  Is it not included with PSN revenue or something??

Without a subscription charge, and ads, that's pretty impressive.

But if the PSN (or rather, SON) has been in the red recently, along with the hardware, does that mean that the games alone are bringing in such an enormous revenue that overall, SCE is making a profit?

This is awesome news! Their strategy will finally start to payoff 

Charging is the most attractive option from a economic perspective but charging this late would be extremely risky..