Market cap = what you have to pay to buy the company! That includes the assets. And MS will be larger than Sony for next decades. Quote me on it if you like to.

And google / Apple / MS will be the three companies to rule the technology industry for the next years. MS won't stop being relevant at all. How coud they with a 20 billion USD profit (2.5 times of google btw) and products like Office or Windows. 

Apple made some great steps the past years. IMO they are limited to two / three products that could decrease really fast. Gadgets like iPhone, iPod and iPad are not evergreens at all. Look at Sony for this one. They were the no. 1 electronic manufacturer in the world and dropped to 3rd or 4th place with very tiny profits compared to the competition like Panasonic and Samsung in a very short period of time. It might happen that the next idevice is not a huge success and that would hurt Apple big time.

Google is basically a 1 product company and that is google-search. Sure there is android or chrome, but search is by far the biggest business for them. Unlike Apple-products, there is no threat towards this business. People will use google-search forever, no matter how good bing or yahoo gets. Same with Windows and Office.

Well it's garenteed thirs for a while, even with shortages it came in third this week, and it's only 35k away from 1st/2nd, but the DS and Wii are selling so closely if 360 takes anything it will take first.

I think for a few weeks in february the 360 will take first, but the 3DS comes out in Japan in 5 weeks, and 9 worldwide. When that happens I think the 3DS will take first, and hold it for a while

However if your talking about just home consoles, then yea I think the 360 will stay ontop until at least E3, and as long as MS can keep Casual fans happy with Kinect, and hardcore fans happy with Gears, Forza, and maybe a Halo 1 remake then except for the last two months of the year (where Wii will take off in sales), then the 360 can be the best selling console for a while. However until shortages are dealt with it's going to have to settle for second, and when PS3/Wii have any big game releases, the 360 will temporarily fall behind.

Holy crap I didn't know MS made 20 billion in profits!  Thats insane!

as far as market cap, yes, microsoft is quite a bit larger.  (for now anyway)  My point was more big picture like assets (ie factories, employee, etc.)  Sony is just as big as Microsoft in that aspect, they just make a lot more profit because there is a lot more margin in software than hardware.

End of the day though, Google and Apple are going to rule the world, so these 3 companies aren't going to be relevant for much longer.

OK this is kinda annoying that people keep saying this. Google hasnt yet even confirmed that their search engine domination. The fact that Bing is climbing ridiculously is enough evidence to this imo.

MS hasn't been threatened that much they are now and they are responding with Kinect for example Windows phone 7, yes the sales aren't there yet. But they will come, it is by far the best OS that I have used. Though this is imo.

Windows7 as in the PC operating system is the fastest selling OS... EVER!! Ms hasn't lost its mojo, it just needs to show it.

Bing as a search engine is really good, and the advantage of  it is also that Google has started new tricks. Like the page preview :)

Since 360 is 50K over PS3 (making 360 at 166% of PS3 sales, which is similar even a bit higher then before "shortages") , I dont think those said "shortages" have a quantifiable effect right now. Maybe in a couple of weeks though, when people will not be able to buy another SKU or simply go to another store to get the specific SKU they want (most cities have a lot of different store selling 360s). I quoted you but could have quote many other.

360 is 50k over PS3? what? 360 outsold the PS3 by about 1k with shortages this week, not 50. So yea, these shortages have a quantifiable effect right now. I went to Best Buy last friday and they only had 1 360 console in stock, for an entire store, and it was the 360 Elite without Kinect. Went to EB games that same day and they only had 4 360 consoles, all Arcade, without Kinect bundles. There were quite a few Kinect stand alone's, but as we see Kinect is the best selling game not bundled with a system and has been for about a month.

I think the 360 shortages depend on cities in locations. The Best Buy and EB games I went to were in downtown Toronto, so maybe in smaller cities, they have a steady supply of 360's, but not here in Toronto.

So my point still stands, with shortages the 360 placed 3rd (2nd on home consoles). I think worst case, until E3, the 360 should be able to outsell the PS3, except for weeks where PS3 sees a big exclusive release (like LittleBigPlanet 2). Realistically Wii sales will drop, and so will DS, so the 360 could come in first place against all systems in it's generation, but I think the 3DS can beat the 360, at least for most weeks.

We dunno how well the Kinect momentum will carry 360, that's why I say only until E3 will 360's reign of power last. After that it's anyones guess, last year Sony was the best selling home console until E3, then 360 jumped passed it, then PS3 got back ontop with Move, then 360 jumped past with Kinect, then Wii took the holidays.

Pre-E3 we know Wii and DS sales will drop, just like in 2010, and it's very likely that the 360 stay above the PS3 and PSP. The only question is how well will the 3DS do, and how long will MS manage to stay ontop??

Obviously I was talking of where the "shortages" are, meaning america. 166% of PS3 sales is extremely good result, it has rarely been at this level even during the last holidays. According to Microsoft statement about their american stock, it will surely get a lot lower during february, then you can blame the shortages. I didnt bother reading the rest after this introduction.

Actually Microsoft said shortages are to experienced throughout January and February, and they said at the very earliest to expect shortages to stop by February. 166% of PS3 sales in Americas is normal, maybe even a bit low for the 360. I recall seeing it sell 2:1 after the 360 Slim, and I think after shortages are over it should sell about that much better in the Americas due to the popularity of Kinect. It's very unusual to see a game outsell the console 11 weeks after it's release, so I really feel shortages are still in effect.

166% isnt low by any mean, its one of the highest difference. 2:1 was right after the slim release. Feel free to compare using the tool's website, 166% isnt low. The week before was lower then this, it was about 133% if I remember well. Doesnt seem like shortages have a quantifiable effect as of now.