If PS5 shipments go on like this it could lose its aligned lead over the PS4.
How far ahead is it now?

In Japan ps5 is about 20k ahead of PS4. It will lose it next week unless there's a big shipment suddenly. Might retake it in december though as launch aligned PS4 is in February now.

I think he means lifetime, which is true. It's just behind the US and the UK and just in front of Germany. But Japan also has a very big population. Selling 3mil units in Japan is a flop while in the UK it would be a success.

I don't think so. PS5 sales have been significantly inflated by the global PS5 shortage, because it's clear from the software sales that the actual demand for the PS5 sits far below the hardware sales it has achieved so far.

You can't ignore how much the software situation has changed either. Last generation it was the norm that a lot of third party games skipped the Nintendo consoles, but by now it's almost exclusively only the bigger Japanese software publishers who have games left that aren't coming to PS and Nintendo, but only PS. These big budget games are bigger sellers and therefore more important individually, but they are also far fewer in numbers, so the PS5's hardware baseline will inevitably suffer over the years.

The only way PS5 vs. PS4 can remain a close race is if the global chip shortage persists for several years in combination with a too big ongoing PS5 allocation for Japan. The semiconductor shortage will continue well into 2022, but Sony's too high shipment allocation might not go hand in hand with that as it did for most of 2021. Sometime during 2023 it should become clearly visible in the PS5 vs. PS4 comparison that the PS5 won't be able to keep up.

How can one determine the native demand for PS5 based off software sales if the global shortage is drawing consoles from the country? People do not buy software for platforms they don't own, but how many people want to own the platform? 

mostly casue the very low attach ratio in japan specifically, where there is a high phisical attatch ratio AND the cheapest place to buy the console, means that its very likely that a LOT of the consoles sold in japan are actually resold overseas.

plus, we are still in year 1, meaning its still early adopter boom stage so far.

I don't think so. PS5 sales have been significantly inflated by the global PS5 shortage, because it's clear from the software sales that the actual demand for the PS5 sits far below the hardware sales it has achieved so far.

You can't ignore how much the software situation has changed either. Last generation it was the norm that a lot of third party games skipped the Nintendo consoles, but by now it's almost exclusively only the bigger Japanese software publishers who have games left that aren't coming to PS and Nintendo, but only PS. These big budget games are bigger sellers and therefore more important individually, but they are also far fewer in numbers, so the PS5's hardware baseline will inevitably suffer over the years.

The only way PS5 vs. PS4 can remain a close race is if the global chip shortage persists for several years in combination with a too big ongoing PS5 allocation for Japan. The semiconductor shortage will continue well into 2022, but Sony's too high shipment allocation might not go hand in hand with that as it did for most of 2021. Sometime during 2023 it should become clearly visible in the PS5 vs. PS4 comparison that the PS5 won't be able to keep up.

We can derive from first year sales of the Vita and the PS4 that less than a million Japanese gamers would have wanted a PS5 during year 1, based on the PS5 lineup not being any more appealing than its predecessor's. If Japanese gamers were truly interested in the PS5, then there would be more effort from their side to get one and more effort from retailers to sell to Japanese gamers, because that way the retailers could sell games too.

We know that PS5's bought in Japan are exported afterwards, so it should go without saying that numbers from lotteries are inflated too.

You misunderstood my post. Too low supply in countries with actually high demand for the PS5 has resulted in PS5 consoles being bought in Japan for the sole purpose of being exported into countries where people want to own them (primarily mainland Asia and South America). This is why PS5 hardware and PS5 software sales in Japan are so out of sync with each other.

The situation is going to come to an end by either global demand being met or Sony stopping to ship more PS5s to Japan than there's demand for them among Japanese gamers. Due to the chip shortages the latter is more likely to happen sooner.