Just what the title said.  Sony seems to be drifting away from that in their games division.  However, it seems MS and Nintendo still have it, although the DS is region free.

Before I give mine, I want some opinions on the issue.

I think they do worth it, most of all with the likes of Nintendo that releases the games even with half a year of differences between regions (Japan and America, and don't start me with Europe).
It could be good though, because there is a lot of Japanese games, Americans never get to see, although all American games we do get to see haha.
Maybe if they do get coordinated release dates, they could unlock the region, but is not because they can't, is because they don't wan, since NES was like that and never even have treid to mend it. So do not expect it in the near future.

thats what i love about the ps3, i can play games from all over the world. so lets say i dont know a multi-plat game is released in NA. but is not in europe for like a couple of months, i can just go onto ebay a get a copy of said game shipped to me for my ps3 whilst all the people with just a 360 have to wait muahahahaha

oh yh and same goes for the Wii almost forgot about that lol

Different games appeal to different regional markets. So in a way region lockouts are necessary.

Regional lockouts are pointless. Though it does stop importing games, and cutting prices from the local ones, but it does just annoy gamers. Also, it encourages developers to get the launches closer together (just a little bit)

The region locks are kind of a remnant from the different TV-standards time and the 360 region lock is optional for the publishers, so looking at the games which are locked and which are not, you can see which publishers think they are necessary.
From the publishers perspective, non-locked games, when imported, are a huge loss of money due to currency exhanges.

It works also in bringing the localised versions prices lower.

In the other hand, you don't need region locks, as long as you can sue the importers.

Region lock is another way of saying, "I can charge you whatever the hell I want and you can't do shit about it."

I was going to say something similar, but that just about sums it up. Region locking sucks. Period. (and now that you mention it, DRM sucks too)

Region locking is only implemented so that companies can make more money. So for consumers of course they arent worth it