I disagree. They aren't free, they aren't rentals, it is a subscription model. Games I rent I have to give back within a few days... if I want to play them again, I have to pay again.

Agreed. 360 came out 10 YEARS AGO, it's time to die

They shouldn't, PS3 is still a nice console for people that doesn't want to spend 450-500 € at the moment in buying a new console (I mean sure, it's 400€, but you'll need a second controller and the PS Plus... not that I'm going to buy the PS+ because I don't give a crap abount connecting my console to the web, but I know most of the people actually cares about playing online). Here in Italy, you can buy a PS3 for pretty much half of the price and, using that, you have access to ha huge amount of games for a very low price (I bought Heavenly Sword for 3€, and a second copy PS All-Stars for 10€) and free online play is always something cool.
PS3 is still something revelant on the market, I know Italy is a weird place compared to the USA (we still have tons of PS2 and PSP games everywhere in the stores, and I know many people that stil uses their PS2, me too actually) and the PS3 here will die way slowly than other places, but I'm pretty sure that what I said counts for many other places too.

At the end, they still make money out of it and people still loves the PS3, so why not keeping it alive ? PlayStation 2 officially died in 2013 (Italy still trackes PS2 sales however) with the release of Fifa/Pes 2014, that's not "many years" ago actually lol

I'm not sure why. It plays games in HD, it plays BluRay, it plays a whole bunch of great games you can't play on the PS4 (natively). And it's cheap, the games are cheap, which is very important to a lot of people.

You will give them back. At one point you are going to stop paying the subscription or the service will close. Actually, you could keep those rentals you mentioned aslong aslong as you kept paying for them. Well, its the exact same principle, although cheaper.

No, I wont give them back... perhaps the downloads will be deactivated in the future and can't be reactivated, but that's not the same thing as giving rentals back. Physical games also aren't forever... in some years many of my and your CDs, DVDs, Blu-rays and modules won't work anymore, just like many old modules, tapes and diskettes are already unreadable today or the old hardware to read the data breaks down. 

And no matter how often you repeat it: rentals and subscription models aren't the same principle.

Now that I think of it, I wouldn't mind Sony putting the 8th generation out its misery instead.

On a few occasions they give the games the same day they come out on psn. More than once they have given games that I never would have bought but I've ended up really enjoying. 

I don't know about you but 95% of the games I play once I finish I never play again so buying most games doesn't make sense for me I the long term.

Two other things, they sometimes have amazing deals for plus members where you can buy games at a huge discount. Cloud saving. I lost 3 ps3s with all my saved data, cloud saving that automatically backs up my games every night it's is for me. This uiss what I pay for, everything else is a bonus.

I remember Sony saying that 2015 would be the last year they'd support the PS3. Some big third parties, like Ubisoft, said this too iirc.

The downloads will stop working after 30 days or something like that without the periodic verification when you start them up. Try not having your console connected to the internet for that or longer and you will see.

Physical doesnt last forever, but i'm pretty sure its gonna last longer than the service, wich will eventually close once some other more atractive service comes along. Also, there is a limit to the size of your hard drive and games are pretty large on the PS4.

Its ok if you have a different opinion btw, but you didnt really present any arguments that would change my mind. When you stop paying, you will lose acess to the games. That much is a fact. It says so on the QA for the service.

Most of the games i dont want to keep for my collection or don't think i would ever play again i resell. I resell many of them but i keep a nice collection of the games i love for each system.

This is morphing into a physical vs digital debate, but its actually about how many people think the service isnt worth it vs those who do. In the US they seems very popular for some reason, but in the EU they arent. Actually, the attachment rate the services (PS+ or Live) has always been below 50%. What i'm saying is that the services are not flexible enough and should have offers tailored to different kinds of costumers. Shocking apprantly. :P