Sony is a conglomerate, and since I doubt the word means anything to you I will expain it to you. A conglomerate is a company that has divisions that actually do business in a lot of unrelated industries. On the whole Sony's divisions that are doing badly are losing more money then the divisions that are doing well. Basically the console divisions profits are being spent covering losses, and the losses are still greater then the gains. Which is why Sony has been forced to offer up stock option bonds, and has had to delve into its financial reserves to cover the difference. The companies cash reserves are finite, and the company is hardly credit worthy. So Sony is finding it harder to borrow. So no it doesn't mean anything, and it has nothing to do with it being Sony. I would apply this same logic to any other company in this exact same position.

I suppose you would argue that people who have cancer should just roll over and die too. A company in dire straights isn't a company without hope. Maybe the company won't survive this situation, but then again maybe it will. It is entirely possible that Sony could fester five years, and suddenly come out with another break out hit. That turns into a cash generating machine. That said I think you need to grow up, and act like the age your profile says you are. I don't know what kind of world you are living in, but sometimes in this life companies just like people have to do things to get by. If your family is starving, and you have to crawl around in pig shit all day long to feed them. Then that is what you do. You don't give up until there isn't a single chance left. The management, employees, and the stock holders of Sony need this company to carry on. Throwing a shit fit, and walking away from their responsibilities isn't a option. They will keep trying until they find a way or run out of chances, and that is just how it is.

Nintendo lost the console wars, but that isn't the same as getting the stuffing beat out of them. The difference being that Nintendo didn't lose money trying. They sold their hardware at a profit, sold a lot of their own first party software, and had the best selling portable gaming device. Nintendo actually did quite well for itself. It is a object lesson in going with the flow. Nintendo didn't need to dominate the market as a whole to be successful. They just needed to cater to a market of loyal consumers. Which was large enough to sustain the company in the industry. Sony would do well to learn some of these lessons from Nintendo. That is how Nintendo wasn't trounced, and this is how Sony was.

Others have shown you the graphs that show you how much Sony lost. The past generation is the text book definition of a Pyrrhic victory. Those losses probably don't even take into account the seven hundred million dollars in loans that Sony has to pay interest on that it took out to fund production of the PS3, or the overhaul of the online security that had to happen, because of the whole jailbreaking fiasco. That saw Sony getting hacked every other day for about two whole months straight. The answer to your question would seem to be self apparent. Were Sony to eat such losses again the company would likely go bankrupt, but you can relax. Sony wouldn't bankrupt the company to salvage a PS4 doing that poorly. No they would just abandon the product.

Propaganda isn't a substitute for facts. I hope you understand that if you continue on this route. All you are going to get for your effort is pulverized. Think what you want about this community, but we aren't slouches. We know a great deal about what we are talking about, and many of us have been on this site since the start of this past generation. We have a real good grasp of what happened, when it happened, and why it happened. Sony basically created a hostage situation that it couldn't walk away from. They couldn't allow the PS3 to die like it ought to have, because it would have destroyed their chip business, their new media format, their software studios, and their home console line. They were pot committed, and they were going to lose a lot of money no matter which way they went.

Because consoles are more consumer friendly ( ie. you can sit in a comfotable chair with your feet up while playing them) and they cost much less than gaming pcs (ie. less than $500.00 Versus $2,000.00 for a decent system that requires upgrades every two years to keep up).

The thought is that they will be selling the consoles at a huge loss.  They could build a console for $500.00 using the best tech that money would buy and release it at that cost without having a huge loss on each console sold.

In Japan the PS2 was still beating the 360 until fairly recently in sales.  Probably it was receiving some relevant level of sales until 2010 like Wii.  As I said they're both being retired at about the same time.  Sony has stopped producing PS2 consoles and Nintendo seems to have stopped making any real effort with the original Wii.

In the bigger picture, the 7th Gen is going to be remembered primarily as the era of the advent of HD Graphics in home video games (since Wii U is the first Nintendo console with HD video output and since it's really only more powerful versus 360 and PS3 in about the same respect as Wii to PS2 and not even to the extent that 360 and PS3 are to Wii, then Wii U should be considered Nintendo's 7th Gen console).  Since the original Wii was never capable of outputting HD visuals, then it really shouldn't be counted as a 7th Gen console.

The PS3 will pass Wii in 2015 (2014 in Japan).

Yes, it's been the best selling console for like a year or two - doesn't mean it'll catch up to Wii. And question is how much more will it sell than the 360? But none of that matters as Sony more or less haven't earned any money from the PS3. They lost a shit load of money in the beginning, and it's not until recently they've hit their pre-PS3 levels of money. That is not a sustainable business model.

The difference between x3ox and PS4 is that MS has a lot of money. They can afford to produce a console at $500 and sell it for $400 - Sony can't. This make MS extremely competitive and can under cut PS4's price point every step of the way. And one of the reasons the Europeans DIDN'T buy a Wii U is BECAUSE of it's high price tag. €350 is a lot in EU right now, so do you really expect Sony to be successful with a €500 system?! It's gonna bomb HARD if it releases with that price. Sony will be forced to cut the price and lose money on it, money they don't have.

It doesn't matter how you count the generations; we number them because it makes it easier for the industry (and the fans) to talk about them. No matter how you wanna see the generations, it's a fact we compare the Wii with PS360 - because they're competing against each other for out money. That's what matters. It doesn't matter whether or not you think of Wii U as a gen 7 or gen 8 machine; it will compete with PS720 for the market's money. THAT'S what matter.

The Wii is dead and isn't getting any more games; THAT'S why PS3 is gaining on it. Nintendo dropped that piece of machine as if it was poison, and it shows. A much more relevant comparison would be 3DS vs Vita. Tell me, how is that race going? Last I saw the numbers 3DS had sold over 10m in Japan while Vita is stuck somewhere around 500k. Seriously, that's a HUGE difference. Both consoles are being supported and are new entries to the market. Vita is much more powerful than 3DS, so how come 3DS is consistently outselling Vita if Japanese wants better graphics and power? Please explain that to me. 3DS is an inferior piece of technology, and yet it's selling like crazy. It's really and ass raping of the Vita on a scale I've never seen before.

Let's compare 3DS vs Vita with Wii U vs PS4:

Vita/PS4 has/will have superior technology

3DS/Wii U launched earlier

3DS/Wii U is cheaper

What does that tell you? PS4 will be a huge failure if Sony follows your advice.

well said!