From the company:
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Requires iPhone 2.0 Software Update

It’s available at the Apple’s Ap store or iTunes. 

According to Ben Silverman over at yahoo!, Sony has lost over 3 BILLION Dollars on the PS3.  Normally in this case I would write something pithy like “that’s a lot of change!” or “wonder how much they lost in other months!”  but instead, I think I’ll quietly sit here with my mouth open. 

From the article:

“In a statement, Sony claimed “the large-scale investment required during the development and introductory period of a new gaming platform may not be fully recovered.” They went on to note that they’ve invested a great deal of money into R&D for the console, a sum they might not be able to recoup if the PS3 ‘fails to achieve such favorable market penetration.’”

Source

Don’t worry, though.  Sony lost all that money on the PS3 hardware.  They are still making boatloads in software sales from everything I have heard.  Plus of course they sold a couple tvs, stereos, etc.  I’m sure they are doing ok. 

But if you do feel the need to donate to a good cause, you can always make the check out to Kevin and John at geekscribe.com.  We’ll put the cash to good use.  Some of it may even go to Sony, by way of Best Buy. 

Scientists unveiled the world’s fastest supercomputer on Monday, a $100 million machine that for the first time has performed 1,000 trillion calculations per second in a sustained exercise.

The technology breakthrough was accomplished by engineers from the Los Alamos National Laboratory and IBM Corp. on a computer to be used primarily on nuclear weapons work, including simulating nuclear explosions.

The computer, named Roadrunner, is twice as fast as IBM’s Blue Gene system at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which itself is three times faster than any of the world’s other supercomputers, according to IBM.

“The computer is a speed demon. It will allow us to solve tremendous problems,” said Thomas D’Agostino, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration, which oversees nuclear weapons research and maintains the warhead stockpile.

But officials said the computer also could have a wide range of other applications in civilian engineering, medicine and science, from developing biofuels and designing more fuel-efficient cars to finding drug therapies and providing services to the financial industry.

To put the computer’s speed in perspective, it has roughly the computing power of 100,000 of today’s most powerful laptops stacked 1.5 miles high, according to IBM. Or, if each of the world’s 6 billion people worked on hand-held computers for 24 hours a day, it would take them 46 years to do what the Roadrunner computer can do in a single day.

The IBM and Los Alamos engineers worked six years on the computer technology.

Some elements of the Roadrunner can be traced back to popular video games, said David Turek, vice president of IBM’s supercomputing programs. In some ways, he said, it’s “a very souped-up Sony PlayStation 3.”

“We took the basic chip design (of a PlayStation) and advanced its capability,” said Turek.

Qore will allow multiple windows, picture-in-picture, and more while viewing. Sony has stated that this setup “provides advertisers with a new class of interactive advertising through rich media executions, video trailers, active ad pages and contextual branding.”

Subscriptions for 13-episodes of Qore will be available at $24.99, with subscribers getting “special access to game demos, betas, add-ons and other downloadable and game-related content.” For a limited time, subscribers will also get Incognito’s top-down criminal chasing title Calling All Cars! for free.

Qore will hit the PlayStation Store on the first Thursday of every month. This is going to be very cool and overall much cheaper then some other game magazines I occasionally buy.

From their site:

“Capable of delivering audio that is bit-for-bit identical to the studio master at super high variable bit rates, DTS-HD Master Audio has been included in several stand-alone Blu-ray players, but its availability on the PS3 will for the first time bring full spectrum premium audio to the masses.”

Apparently, there are already 100 Blu-ray movies that utilize this sound format.  Click here for more information about that.

I checked on the PS3 site… it appears as though the sound upgrade will occur at the same time the previously announced change to the PS3 store will occur.  John posted about that upgrade earlier.  Here is the link for the PS3 site.  It has a cool video about the new store. 

Disappointed by PlayStation’s inability to appeal to casual gaming, Harrison is leaving for Atari.  What does this mean for the Sony PlayStation?  No clue really. This stuff happens all the time I’m sure, but it seemed to create quite the buzz in the gaming industry.

I applaud PlayStation for sticking to their guns by continuing to push the envelope in hard-core gaming. The Wii may be outselling the 360 and PS3,
but its a novelty machine in my mind.  The system is innovative, but it will top off in my mind. I believe Nintendo has found its market niche and will keep with it and continue to go in a direction I care little about….

I do agree, from different media sources, that the PS3 will eventually take the lead in the current run of machines. Although, once the PS3 starts putting out games that surpass anything the 360 can handle, Microsoft will probably announce the release date of their next machine. What happens then? PS3 will lower their price again, and I’m sure there will be 360 users that may switch over. The big flaw in the PS3 now is the online play and how at this moment they don’t have a LIVE type set up. I hear its coming, so things may change and shift.

Note from John: When I’m online, I can see what friends are on and off, what they are playing, find and join them, chat and send messages. It’s not the most user friendly system, but improvements are just a patch download away and coming. 

My question is on whether there will be enough big games on the PS3 that will be truly next generation that will turn the heads of the 360 players? Third Party developers, I imagine, want to bring in the highest revenue possible; so why make games exclusively for the PS3 when they can release them for both the 360 and PS3 (unless they have contract ties with either Sony or Microsoft)? This undermines the PS3’s power capability, but do third party developers care? Probably not. We may see a big game come out of Bungie for the PS3 since their separation from Microsoft, that would be exciting for PS3 owners.

OH and the big news for the 360: Gears of War 2 exclusively for the 360 coming out this year. Sorry, had to mention that one…

2007 was big for the 360’s exclusive games:  Mass Effect, Bioshock, and Halo 3 to name a few. I am excited about how 2008 will pan out. Let’s see if the PS3 can step up to the plate with their big exclusive games. Wii players, go F yourself with your casual gaming…

You can read about Phil Harrison’s move here

According to an analyst at ABI research the end of the format war was not the true measure of consumer demand when it came to the choice of HD format. The true decision was made by Warner brothers decision to jump ship to Blu-ray. The decision to switch may have been principally decided not by which format the consumers of Warner’s preferred, but by a nearly $120 million payoff from Sony.

Source

Well, it’s just a bunch of whining at this point and sure, maybe they did make a payoff. That’s called business and Microsoft has done same thing a million times over. Here’s a good article to read about the whole thing.

Both formats had good technology. It was the key relationships which Sony nurtured and cultivated that ultimately won the day. Yes, technology was a factor. However, the big decisions in business are made by people who make decisions for emotional reasons. Sorry about that, my die-hard techie friends. It ain’t about the technology. (I know, bad English but true). It always has been and always will be about relationships. Cultivate these and you build Relationship Marketing (R-Commerce).

Achieve key wins which stack up to an insurmountable victory

Sony didn’t win only one battle in the Blu-ray vs. HD-DVD fight. They won several over a period of time. You can’t win the ultimate prize with only one knockout blow (sorry, Hollywood — it just doesn’t work that way in the real world). Don’t rest on your past victories. Each day, you face anew the opportunities to engage in competition and learn and grow no matter what happens. Become a better person with each day’s results.

Lower prices don’t win the day

Source

Oh, and don’t forget that Blu-Ray did very well in disc sales too. Almost 2:1 in some cases.

Well, it’s official. After pretty much every major studio backed the Blu-Ray technology format, HD DVD died a slow and agonizing death. As it lay in it’s bed on life support, Toshiba stepped in a pulled the plug. I also believe there is a no resuscitate order.

Toshiba Corporation today announced that it has undertaken a thorough review of its overall strategy for HD DVD and has decided it will no longer develop, manufacture and market HD DVD players and recorders. This decision has been made following recent major changes in the market. Toshiba will continue, however, to provide full product support and after-sales service for all owners of Toshiba HD DVD products.

HD DVD was developed to offer consumers access at an affordable price to high-quality, high definition content and prepare them for the digital convergence of tomorrow where the fusion of consumer electronics and IT will continue to progress.

“We carefully assessed the long-term impact of continuing the so-called ‘next-generation format war’ and concluded that a swift decision will best help the market develop,” said Atsutoshi Nishida, President and CEO of Toshiba Corporation. “While we are disappointed for the company and more importantly, for the consumer, the real mass market opportunity for high definition content remains untapped and Toshiba is both able and determined to use our talent, technology and intellectual property to make digital convergence a reality.”

Toshiba will continue to lead innovation, in a wide range of technologies that will drive mass market access to high definition content. These include high capacity NAND flash memory, small form factor hard disk drives, next generation CPUs, visual processing, and wireless and encryption technologies. The company expects to make forthcoming announcements around strategic progress in these convergence technologies.

Toshiba will begin to reduce shipments of HD DVD players and recorders to retail channels, aiming for cessation of these businesses by the end of March 2008. Toshiba also plans to end volume production of HD DVD disk drives for such applications as PCs and games in the same timeframe, yet will continue to make efforts to meet customer requirements. The company will continue to assess the position of notebook PCs with integrated HD DVD drives within the overall PC business relative to future market demand.

This decision will not impact on Toshiba’s commitment to standard DVD, and the company will continue to market conventional DVD players and recorders. Toshiba intends to continue to contribute to the development of the DVD industry, as a member of the DVD Forum, an international organization with some 200 member companies, committed to the discussion and defining of optimum optical disc formats for the consumer and the related industries.

Toshiba also intends to maintain collaborative relations with the companies who joined with Toshiba in working to build up the HD DVD market, including Universal Studios, Paramount Pictures, and DreamWorks Animation and major Japanese and European content providers on the entertainment side, as well as leaders in the IT industry, including Microsoft, Intel, and HP. Toshiba will study possible collaboration with these companies for future business opportunities, utilizing the many assets generated through the development of HD DVD.

Source

So there you have it. Blu-Ray is now the winner of the format war. Ha Ha Ha!

Sorry, I just have been waiting forever to say that. After all…I bought a PlayStation 3 pretty early on. I spent my nights crying while X-box 360 people were bragging about Transformers on HD DVD and playing games. Every so often when I was really down and thinking my PS3 was just a piece of junk, that single blue light would wink at me. So I hung in there time after time. Blow after blow. I feel like Rocky taking shot after shot, but finally winning in the end.

Long live Blu-Ray!