In an interview with Japanese site Impress Watch, Sony Computer Entertainment president Ken Kutaragi has re-iterated that the PS3 online service will be free from subscription fees, with money being made instead through the download service.

"You can't charge money for network matching and other basic services. These things are just taken for granted on the PC," said Kutaragi. "On the PS3, basic services will be taken for granted while content will be the bread and butter of our business."

He even suggested that optical drives could become obsolete.

"I expect even the hard disk to disappear eventually," he said. "If you have all the data on servers, you probably no longer need disk drives... But to do this, the server is crucial. It's a difficult problem."

Gamers will also be glad to hear that the PS3 online service will be available on launch day.

The Xbox live service wiped the floor with Sony’s under par online service for the PS2. Whilst Microsoft have a unified, subscription-based online service, the PS2 online service is run on third-party servers. This results in lag whenever there is a slow connection. The PS3 live service however should be Worlds apart from PS2 online gaming.

Source : Impress Watch