I guess what I hate the most about Sony and Microsoft is making the gaming part of their consoles almost an afterthought. Sony used the PS3 to push blu-ray. Microsoft wanted the Xbox to keep Sony from entering the living room (a place they really want to be, as creepy as it sounds. No Mr. Gates, you can't come into my house!). The 360 is suppose to push digital distribution.
The features that the PS3 and 360 offer are incredible. Playing music, movies, editing pictures, card readers, who knows what else (I don't...). But does any of that have anything to do with the games? No. But it does up the cost of the hardware. Nintendo is the only company in the gaming business for the gaming business. The other companies are in the gaming business to push other business.
Actually what's interesting about Nintendo is that they don't push other stuff (like blu-ray) by including it in their consoles. They do it the other way around. Instead of pushing products through their hardware, they push their hardware through external products (in a way). The DS is being used at Nintendo-owned baseball team (can't recall the team) so that users can download replays, stats, scores, etc. All wireless through the DS. Disney World is implementing a DS map service like thing. This is because Nintendo doesn't have (much of) anything but video gaming, so they have to keep the video game business alive. Sony and Microsoft don't care about it as much, since they see the video game business as a way to enter other business (such as digital distribution, movie formats, media centers, etc).
Now of course, all companies are out for profit. That's the nature of business (and I am a business major; hence I know all 
). So I don't blame Microsoft and Sony for doing what they do. They are in the market to make money. Period. And please, don't kid yourself. They aren't in it to "please the gamers" or whatnot. Nintendo is, of course, in the market as well to make money. The difference between Sony/Microsoft and Nintendo is that Nintendo doesn't have anything to fall back on, so they have to make money in the market of video games. Whereas Sony and Microsoft have other means to make money (and use it to back the video game business). Also, to them, the video gaming market is not a very profitable market, since they use the loss-lead business model. But the reason they stay in it is to push other, much more profitable, ventures, such as blu-ray. Blu-ray will probably make more money for Sony than the PS1&PS2 combined did (just a guess). I would guess this because they were willing to sacrifice a whole generation just to get a blu-ray victory. And let's be honest, whether they believed they could win or not, they did sacrifice a generation just to get a blu-ray victory, and I'm sure if there was more money in video games than movie formats, they wouldn't have made this risk. That and they sold the PS3 at a loss, and if they didn't think it could win with blu-ray, and didn't think blu-ray would be a good source for income, then they wouldn't have included it in the PS3.
So, for me, it's a love hate relationship. I love them for using any source for revenue (and hopefully profit), and let's be honest (I like honesty, good business practice), Sony is good at what they do. Microsoft is decent at what they do (they have a word for it, Monopoly, but I still like most of their products). But I hate them for using gaming as a way to enter other markets, and making gaming a afterthought for why they entered the market.
I'd also like to point out that this line: "it is unlikely that the manufacturers will drop this model as it has been proven to be one of the best business models for consoles that offer more than just the ability to play videogames." is pretty stupid. No offense. But honestly, besides gaming, what have pre-this generation consoles offered? I would say that NES/SNES/N64 generation consoles usually only did gaming, though I guess the PS1 could play CDs? The PS2 could play DVDs. The Xbox could also play DVDs and, though I don't know for sure, probably did other things, but probably not a lot. The 360/PS3 can do a good amount of non-gaming stuff. I won't include blu-ray as a non-gaming item, since I think using CDs, DVDs, and Blu-ray add to gaming in ways, though I think blu-ray is a bit ahead of its time for consoles, since it adds too much to the price (which is something the CD/DVD drives didn't do signifigantly). But when looking at "success" rates of the "consoles that offer more than just the ability to play videogames" I would have to say it's 0-3. The Xbox was a failure (don't kid yourself). The 360 and PS3 probably won't be failures in the sense of the GC/Xbox type, but the PS3 won't live up to the hype of the PS2 (nor the sales, profits, etc), and the 360 likely won't do as well as the PS3. Both won't measure up to the Wii, which, besides a few online functions and picture editors (both of which seem to be more of an afterthought than anything), is simply a gaming console. At it's core, it's a gaming console.
Course, at it's core, the Wii is also a GameCube. Let's not kid ourselves.
