Well, no significant damage as long as you believe piracy doesn't cause lost sales...

when you consider all the free codes taken...

If you did...

Eh, if the stolen coupon codes are published, they can all be invalidated by Sony, who should know what was stolen and the only party to whom they are redeemable (i think), and can create a ton of new codes all their own.

They get more damage in any given hour of the day from random bittorrent downloads than they will from this, i think (unless the codes are more broadly redeemable)

Think what you will, I do indeed have preferences but then again everybody does.  I do own a PS3 though hence my strong opinion on what has happened.

But they claimed they lost all sorts of money the last time they were hacked and had a bunch of codes stolen... takes their download bandwith too... just thinking from THEY'RE point of view.  Or the one they tend to show in the media.

I think it is a fair criticism to say that improvements in Sony security is entirely wishful thinking. The only fair analysis is based upon precedent. No I am not just talking about this string of attacks either. Sony has shown incredibly little in the way of concern for customer safety. From selling compact discs which installed malicious code on customer computers. To batteries that exploded. For Sony safety is obviously not job one, and more often then not they don't seem to make a job of it at all. Seriously they touted actually creating a chief position to oversee security. That is a good thing. However it also highlights the fact that nobody was at the wheel earlier.

For a company of this size to not have a over arching infrastructure, contingency plans, public relations plans, or a staff necessary for self resolution. Speaks to a company that is just short sighted. Cyber terrorism is a real concern. There is no reason that their situation in regards to it could be utterly absent. Will they learn from this short term I do have to agree yes. It is a open wound after all. Will they stick to this after the dust settles. Probably not I am sorry to say. For this to work they must have a long term mindset. Sony seems however to think only in the short term. This is why they keep repeating these public relations disasters.

As opposed to Sony being more competent in their security?  Petitioning against hack attacks is like pettitioning against crime.  What the heck is a large number of signatures against a crime going to do?  Will people doing criminal activity go, "Golly gee, a lot of people hate what wer are doing... we better stop!"

In regards to the hacks, I guess people want to do their own ME TO's in regards to following up on what Anonymous discussed.