As analysts struggle with trying to interpret Sony's latest moves and Nintendo's upcoming console reveal (as well as Microsoft's unrevealed plans), it may behoove us not to pay too much attention to what those analysts have to say.

I found this nugget when looking for news on Sony's financials today.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/analyst-ps3-to-win-next-gen-war-6155912

Analyst: PS3 to win next-gen war

The Yankee Group predicts 30 million PS3s, 27 million Xbox 360s, and 11 million Wiis sold in North America by 2011.

...

(No need to show the whole article).

The current numbers (three months since the end of 2011) are 42.64M Wiis, 36.97 Xbox 360s, and 22.48 PS3s.  So these numbers were just a bit off.

Even more interesting in that the market size was predicated to be 68M and it turned out to be over 100M.

(For reference, in North America, the PS2 sold 56.35M, the PS 38.94M, the N64 20.11M, the Xbox 15.77M, the Gamecube 12.55M, , the Dreamcast 3.90M, and the Saturn 1.83M)

All actual sales data from VGChartz's Platform Totals and is for North America.

The point here is not to blast any particular console or any particular analyst -- but rather to show that predictions must be taken with a grain of salt and that past performance is not indicative of future success.

Mike from Morgantown

Ah! But we didn't have our active Pach back then did we, and he is always right... :P

I originally had a slap at Pachter in my OP, but removed it since I thought it was in bad taste -- or sort of like shooting fish in a barrell.

Mike from Morgantown

This saying means X was sucessful in the past but doesnt mean it will be sucessful in the future

Now here what happened is X wasnt sucessfull i.e. the opposite :) so 

you should of written 

that past performance is not indicative of future failure 

As a general guideline, don't trust any financial advice from someone you don't pay directly ...

A person's loyalty (as limited as it may be) is to the person who pays them so working with a mutual fund "expert" who is paid a commission based on fund sales will likely advise you to buy the funds with the highest commission, and a Realtor who is paid a commission on the sale of a house will likely be pushing you to buy/sell at all times. Videogame analysts are really giving out financial advice and, since you have no clue who is paying them to give this advice, you don't really know who they're loyal to; or why they're giving the advice they're giving.

I tried to say it the way you hear it in investment commercials as a disclaimer. Both statements actually apply.