I think 10 years of a lifespan was to be expected.

The PS3 is a very powerful machine and is IMHO slightly ahead of its time (Blu-ray etc)...so a lifespan of 10 years isn't totally outlandish in my books. 

I think Sony should analyse the past generations a little bit better before making such announcements. If a console fails saleswise in its first two or three years, it has no chance to come back anymore. So in my eyes, a ten-year lifecycle for the ps3 is suicide if sales don't start to improve very soon.

Just imagine Nintendo would have stuck with the Gamecube for another five years, saying that it doesn't matter they didn't sell that much in the first years because the Cube will be around for a longer time than it's contrahents. This doesn't work. An uncool console won't become cool just because it does not get a successor. In five years, Nintendo will most likely release a Wii 2 with at least PS3 comparable graphics and Microsoft (if they stay in the gaming industry) will launch something new that is superior to the PS3. So if PS3 wasn't able to beat Wii and X360, how will it beat their successors?

Of course I'm assuming that PS3 loses this generation, a ten-year lifecycle might be possible for a winning console like PS2.

The PS3 stands no chance to last ten years unless it has sold (roughly) 50 Million units by 2011.

In 2011 you should be able to produce a far more powerful system that matches or surpass' every feature that the PS3 has and sell your system at a far lower price than the PS3 currently costs; in other words the main selling features of the PS3 will be taken away from it and (unless it has the existing userbase) it will not have the momentium to continue until 2016.

Jack Tretton has to say that it will last 10 years because no one would pay $600 for a system if they believed they would be replacing it with another $600 (or at the current rate of growth $1000) system 4 years from now; at the same time he is correct that there are no technical reasons the PS3 could not continue for 10 years (but there is also no technical reason why the PS2 outlasts the Gamecube and XBox).

The PS1 had and the PS2 is going have ten year lifespans...

The PS2 has been around since 2000 (7 years) and there is now 3 systems (theoretically) that are more powerful on the market....the 360 has been on the market for 18 months now....but are PS2 games still being produced?

Yes, Nintendo could release the Wii 2 which could be more powerful than the PS3...but how much would it cost?

By the time Nintendo or MS for that fact release a new system...the PS3 could be $200 or less anyway.

More interesting is what was written further down in the article:

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=24960 

However Kyoshi Shin of Japan's International Game Developers' Association was less positive, suggesting that many developers are shifting their focus to Nintendo Wii.

"When people talk about the PS3 on chat forums, they say it's like going to a very expensive restaurant and not getting anything to eat," he added. 

First off, there is nothing "theoritical" about there being 3 systems on the market that are more powerful than the PS2; there were 2 systems that were more powerful than the PS2 in the previous generation and the weakest system is noticeably more powerful than (at least) one of those (probably both, but we won't get into arguments about something neither of us can prove).

Back in 2000 (when the PS2 was released) a Bleeding edge Intel Processor was the Pentium 3 1GHz and Sony claimed the PS2's emotion engine was more powerful than a Pentium 3 733MHz; in some ways it is but (for the most part it isn't) but we will not get into that. Currently, you can get a Athlon 64 X2 3800+, which is dramatically faster than the PS2's emotion engine, for next to nothing; you see the same kind of improvements in GPUs over the same timeframe. I see no reason why this pattern will change, thus in 2011 you should be able to produce a system that is 8 to 10 times as powerful as the PS3 for $200 to $300.

Now, the PS3 may see price reductions but (unless Sony gets desperate) it is unlikely that you will see more than $100 reductions per year; this means that the PS3 will likely not be $200 until 2010 or 2011.

The thing that enabled the NES, Gameboy, SNES, Playstation, PS2 and Gameboy Advance to continue selling (quite well) after they had been replaced by 'better' systems was their large userbases; the 100,000,000+ PS2 users will take 2 to 4 years to migrate to a Next Generation gaming platform which means that (for the next 2 to 4 years) the PS2 is still a viable system to release games for.

 The PS1 and PS2 also had more than 70% marketshare. The PS3 has what 16% marketshare right now? Even if some sort of renaissance happens for the PS3, it is unlikely to begin to approach the PS2's or PS1's marketshare. Without a dominating position in the market, there is no way that the PS3 or any of the next gen consoles will have a ten year life span.

 Sony wont discontinue the PS2 for a while yet. They are keeping it as their bargain console which it is sellings pretty well for a 7 year old console.. and they make a profit on it so discontinuing it before they make a profit on the PS3 would be a stupid idea. 

Well maybe it was just the way the game have been developed over the course for the PS2, it seemed that the XBox, DC and GC were all more powerful than the PS2, but seeing as all the other really fell by the wayside...it allowed for developers to make better games on the PS2.

The 360 and PS3 are significantly superior to the PS2...the Wii has yet to show it's improvements, but I reckon it will....although it's more akin to last gen than this gen.