Rumor: Sony Plans To Screw Third Party Publishers

via kotaku

So the PlayStation Network is free, right? Well, nothing is free. Somebody's got to pay for it, and if it's not you or me, it sure as hell ain't gonna be Sony. It's a business, not a charity!

Several industry insiders report that to cover demo download costs, Sony is currently considering charging third party developers. Here's what Sony is apparently thinking: Every time an individual downloads a demo, a service charge will be passed onto the third party developer. So they will pay for you to try out their games, instead of vice-versa. Unconfirmed, but it seems that this way the PS3's online service stays "free," Sony cuts its loses and third party developers get reamed.

A decision has yet to be reached, and Sony is hashing things out at the moment. But, if this sails through, expect the PS3 to have few third party demos, but loads of Blu-ray movie trailers.

Even though it is a rumour, i dont think Sony will be THAT stupid to go ahead with such move. It is a bad for business and eventually, they will be the one to suffer.

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Originally Posted by ElRazur

Even though it is a rumour, i dont think Sony will be THAT stupid to go ahead with such move. It is a bad for business and eventually, they will be the one to suffer.

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you never know, sony has done some pretty stupid/annoying things in the past! XD

but i also think this is unlikely.

hey we see how they screwed us over on homebrew. nothing is too stupid for sony anymore

now sony is going towards the third party, now what? normal people like yo and me?
lmao!!!!!

I doubt this is the case. Demo's don't make money (because they are free) and no self-respecting company would pay money out of pocket for something that they will see no return on.

The Sony Online Store will probably be the biggest money maker for the online service (which is probably why they opted to make a PS1 emulator for the PSP; to earn easy revenue).

If Sony ever sells games on the online store that has a direct-to-drive feature (or maybe game discs will be shipped to your home, I have no idea...) but either way the companies involved are saving money since they don't have to create discs of paper manuals (again, if games are direct-to-drive) and they avoid the expense of distributing these discs and manuals and avoid fees that may be involved when dealing with retail channels. So even though we may pay 40 bucks or even 50 bucks for those games, some of that money goes directly to Sony for the game being sold on their online store.

Such is the only real way the system could work, especially since there is a market for whole games, there is no market for free-demos, which any company would simply put up on the service for a loss. (if the rumor is true, which I doubt it...)