Jeff is hoping that the longer he keeps this up, the greater the glory when Sony follows through with... something.
I don't even know what Jeff is trying to prove anymore.
Hey man, can you give us a thesis statement? One or two sentences (not paragraphs).
The following is obvious and there is no glory in pointing out the obvious.
Sony has a big investment in the PS3 and the design supports more than Games. Witness the Xbox and speculation on its future as a Home Media Center. The PS3 with Blu-ray, IPTV and DLNA (obvious) with some not so obvious abilities has an even greater chance to be an all in one,
"does everything" Media Center and more for Sony in the home.
"It only does everything", first to make money for Sony and to support Sony products. Second, features to make the platform attractive. We can see many of the
first generation features in the PS3 now;
they will be updated (I posted essentially the same PS3 feature upgrade list below months ago).
Browser from Netfront to Webkit2 HTML5
DLNA from 1.0 to 1.5 with RVU version 2 (Webkit UI) using DLNA to stream from Cablebox & Satellite DVR confirmed (Xbox already supporting)*
Chat upgraded to Google and Skype Chat
Video and Picture editing already announced confirmed
Email added (Vita has email)
Full social networking and media sharing
Contact Manager used with email, Google Chat and Friends lists for Games. Contact Manager could be used with
WEBRTC to support Google Chat.
Example video of WebRTC
Apps from the Sony Store
PlayMemories Studio
Playview
Free and for purchase IPTV apps (100's)
Editor (text) NEW Browser supports clipboard as well as cut and paste; Editor is a given.
Home control (4Home) Mentioned in the Sony Snap developers site.
Remote PC desktop
Domino's Pizza app (free)
AND MORE!
Not so obvious is that the PS3 will most likely support 4K blu-ray with a firmware update. It will support 4K home movie video display and editing. It will support Zooming into 4K home movies and at the same time downscale to 1080P TVs.
It will support IPTV using h.265 instead of h.264 allowing 3-D and higher resolution video streams.
I mentioned that 2012 game changers will be: h.265, Webkit2, Gstreamer 1.0 and RVU. Sony has known about the above since 2008 or before.
h.265 (HEVC) will be available in 2013 after it's final draft is published Jan 2013; a working draft is expected Feb 2012, h.265 will enable 4K blu-ray which can use a standard drive but requires a more powerful CPU and a larger video buffer memory. Most blu-ray drives can read at 2X a 4 layer disk which I think includes PS3 slim blu-ray drives so I'm guessing the PS3 can support 4K blu-ray with a firmware update.
h.265 will also support IPTV and using h.265 instead of h.264 will allow for 3-D and higher resolution video streams.
RVU requires DLNA and DTC-IP (in the PS3 since firmware 3.21) with version 1 using bitmapped menus and Version 2 requiring a webkit UI. Both Xbox and PS3 have been planning to support this since before 2009 with Xbox having a version 1 with U-Verse CATV more than a year ago. Prototypes have been beta tested but RVU is getting industry wide support this March 2012.
Webkit2 is a split process webkit that is more secure and potentially faster. Open source POSIX support (Linux and Unix) is not finished yet but projected to be available before the next Gnome cycle in March 2012 (QT and GTK toolkit versions).
Gstreamer 1.0 finished October 2011 and Howard Stringer stated in Nov 2011 that the Ecosystem is finished. Gstreamer is on Sony Google TV, Networked TVs and BLu-ray players and PS Suite's Mono uses Gstreamer and Webkit to support Moonlight (a Silverlight clone) used for Linux and Unix commercial IPTV applications. Sony has contracted the rights to use Micorsoft's Playready DRM on those platforms.
What you can take from the above is that since 2008 Sony has been planning for the above but had to wait for their completion. This is obvious if you have read the links and "white papers". This spring..............
What does it take to support the above; at the core Cairo, Gstreamer and Webkit with the support libraries required by each. This is why the Gnome desktop using just the Gnome Mobile Libraries is attractive. The current discussion is not about Sony plans, they are obvious, but about the software tools that will be used to support the above.
Predictions for 2012 from the experts:
"Ultimately, the Xbox 360 and PS3 could be used as TV tuners (we'll see that this year), and will continue to beef up their content offering for over-the-top internet TV."
"Browser-based gaming will continue to grow," decided Divnich, "especially as developers unlock the potential of HTML5. But I don't believe HTML5 gaming really begins to capture mainstream attention until 2013/2014. There are still plenty of bugs to work out in the HTML5 technology."
"I don't think we'll see anything from Microsoft other than a bigger hard-drive and a lower price-point," Pachter pursued, "and I don't think we'll see anything from Sony at all. The Apple console is probably a 2013 event, so nothing to look forward to this year other than price cuts.
Apple has a Game Console in the works?
http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread.php?t=61454&page=2 said:
zed said:
If I was Sony/Nintendo/MS I'ld be very worried indeed
Indeed.
Although, this is a rarity where Apple aren't creating a new market, and are instead, trying to crack a very competitive one.
Ipod, relatively speaking first of its kind
iphone, same
ipad, same
ibox ... stiff competition here.
Sony may be hurting financially, but Playstation is a very strong brand and they have a solid catalog of IP.
MS isn't hurting, and seem to be clicking on all cylinders, and with an eye on the future.
Nintendo ... honestly is a mess and IMO would make a perfect Bride for Apple.
Regardless, bottom line, MS, Sony, and Nintendo need to step their game up. Big Time.
If Apple is able to bring any of the magic they have in the ipad/pod/phone lineups, this could get ugly ... real quick.
On the hardware side in other NeoGAF threads IBM is creating what amounts to a SOC with CPU, GPU and Memory on one chip. This could reduce costs and if multiple Game Console companies buy it because of reduced cost then this could explain Apple getting into the Console business.
2014 according to Sony is building on 2012 & 2013 with OLED, and Samsung is showing transparent OLED now. 4K blu-ray and 4K OLED TV affordable with 20nm or smaller die process allowing consumer 4K video cameras. The battle for the living room will heat up as the TV becomes even more.
* Xbox RVU menus since the last dashboard update at the end of 2011 look like the Dashboard, are built using dashboard elements not a RVU version 1 bit mapped image of the DVR menu. Verizon DVR, for instance, is supporting both the Xbox and PS3...both will use RVU version 2. A wait till March for Samsung TVs to support RVU might be due to a wait for webkit2 to support the UI.