Sony PS3 VOD Confirmed For Early 2008

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Sony may not be winning with gamers, and lags rival Microsoft’s Xbox LIVE Marketplace in the race to own the living room media hub. But they’re not sitting still either: Word came earlier this year that Sony intends to offer Playstation 3 video downloads, and that day has nearly arrived… in Japan.

According to Variety, Sony will launch its on-demand HD service for the PS3 – in Japan only – early next year. Sadder than the restriction to Japan, however, is the content that will be available at launch. The service will start with car-racing videos and a “BBC car documentary,” all meant to drive interest in Sony’s “Gran Turismo 5 Prologue” game. As popular as NASCAR is here, I doubt that teensy selection of content would generate much interest in the US. One wonders if the Japanese will find it compelling, and, more importantly, when Sony will expand its content to reach a larger audience. The price for Sony’s video downloads is set to begin at $1.85.

Theoretically, Sony is in prime position to own the home entertainment market given its successful consumer electronics brand and the fact the company has a studio ripe with content. But somehow they haven’t managed to put the pieces all together yet.

8 thoughts on “Sony PS3 VOD Confirmed For Early 2008”

  1. zzzzz……zzzzz……(woke up). Ah what did you say? PS3??? (yawn)…..any good games yet?……zzzz…..zzzz…..

  2. Silence! Hear that? Thats the sound of your xbox360 (barf) with the RED RING OF DEATH! Theres your good games now try and play them on your broken down box!! Get a life you TOOL instead of BASHING the PS3.
    Oh and by the way “Sega has no future!”

  3. What they said. I’m slightly interested in the XBox 360’s video service because I might pick one up for the games. I’m not much interested in the PS3 video service because of the dearth of interesting titles. Whether or not they have VOD won’t really enter into it.

    I for example do occaisionally use the Amazon Unbox service on my Tivo, but I wouldn’t tell anybody to buy a Tivo for it. You buy a Tivo to get the Tivo functions, i.e. the DVR. Then you maybe find the VOD offering interesting or not. This is just like that.

    Love to see whether Comcast would throttle something like this though…

  4. If your going to launch VOD, why such skimpy content? Give me a break. Just get me some games!

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