In celebration of the PS3’s third birthday, Sony announced their official figures regarding their Playstation Network.<\/p>\n
The official number reported by Sony is 14million “active users”. This is roughly the same amount of people that are currently using Microsoft’s pay-to-play Xbox Live. <\/p>\n
According to Sony, the active user count includes Playstation Network registrations on the PlayStation Portable. To guard against duplication in their user count, Sony does not count a registration made on the PS3 and then used on the PSP as two accounts.<\/p>\n
Like Xbox Live, the figure also includes multiple accounts used on the same console or in the same household.<\/p>\n
Sony declined to release figures detailing how many of their 14million PlayStation Network users are logging on with the PS3 and how many are using the PSP. <\/p>\n
IDC game-industry analyst Billy Pidgeon estimates that PS3 PSN registration has skyrocketed 160 percent since January 2008. That’s said, he still estimates that only around 50 percent of PS3s have logged onto PSN versus 60 percent for Xbox Live. <\/p>\n
With Sony recently announcing that 17 million PS3s have been sold worldwide, Pidgeon’s estimate pegs the number of PS3 based PSN users at 8.5 million, not 14 million. “Remember though, they’re not claiming that every account is a connected PS3" he told GameSpot. That means that the remaining 5.5 million PSN users are logging on using the PSP. <\/p>\n
Similar to Xbox Live, the Playstation Network allows users to download content such as game add-ons, full games and movies etc. It also allows users to play alongside or against each other online. <\/p>\n
Unlike Xbox Live, the Playstation Network carries no subscription fees. <\/p>\n