We all know that Xbox Live is better than PSN, if only for party chat and cross game invites. But you have to pay for the privilege to play online with Live, unlike the PSN. Well this “Media/Investor Conference” dated November 19^th lists PSN under one of the 5 key advantages of Playstation 3.

That listing under PSN states that it will provide a “new revenue stream from subscription”. Hmmmmm… for now label this as a rumour, but it seems that Playstation fans will soon be paying for some sort of PSN service, but playing online is still going to be free.

VG247 contacted SCEE about the issue and received the following Kaz Hirai quotes.

“SCE will further increase sales by offering users new entertainment through the combination of hardware, software, peripheral and PlayStation Network”

“Especially in the online area, we are studying the possibility of introducing a subscription model, offering premium content and services, in addition to the current free services.”

That sounds to me like the current PSN features will be free and they will introduce a bunch of new features to compete with Xbox Live for a price. What features will they implement? Surely they won’t make us pay for cross game chat and invites? Would they?

If this happens it might put pressure on Microsoft to let silver members play games online with limited functionality. Or it could just stop the complaining about Microsoft’s charging for online. Who knows? Either way we will be talking about it in the forums so why don’t you join us.