Here's a funny idea: since Sony sells its system at loss, and the only way it's going to turn to profit is by software sales, what about if Bill Gates bought lots of PS3s to get rid of the competitor? Gates has easily the money aquired to purchase a magnitude of tens of millions of PS3s. I even think he would get cash quite nicely from the parts. If the consumers wouldn't get PS3s and Sony money from software sales, Sony would die within a year, I'd say. They've already made loss because of the battery withdrawals and PS3 investments and loosing billions of dollars would be fatal. This is pure science fiction of course because the justice system would inhibit such a monopoly, but it shows how the market is not really entirely free after all. There's already been talk about the weak attachment rate of games for PS3. It's been estimated that Sony would need about 6 games sold per console to make profit this generation.

This is what would happen if Bill Gates was stupid enough to try the above strategy, assuming he wasn't prevented by court order..... He would lose more ($550 per console on average) than Sony would ($300 per console). He could not sell the parts, at least not legally, as they are the IP of Sony. Just think that the 4 million consoles that would soon be on the market would cost him $2.2 billion dollars + tax + the cost of transporting the consoles from the retailers. You also have to factor in that he would have to pay a significant premium to the retailers since the retailers could no longer sell the billions of dollars worth of PS3 games and peripherals that they were carrying. The cost would balloon into the 10's of billions of dollars. Now, all the game companies that were developing for the PS3 would be extremely angry over the losses they sunk into PS3 game development, and may consider abandoning XBOX 360 development. Even if he succeeded in harming Sony, he would lose much of his personal weath and damage the success of the XBOX 360 platform. The Wii would be the major beneficiary of the move, and we would probably see 2 new entrants into the market.

lol, no-one would notice the recycling if old Bill would put MS logo on the thing and sell it as a grill.