PlayStation Forums – Good or Bad for Home?
by Burbie52, HSM team writer
The dictionary defines a forum as a place where people can come together and discuss things of public interest, such as a magazine or in the case of the online community a website or page. The PlayStation forums have been around for a long time, so that people can go there for information on the network and fixes for issues in the support area if need be. It is a useful tool if it is in the right hands, but as with all things touched by human beings, at times it seems to be more of a place to condemn rather than discuss, to rant rather than to reason.
I rarely go there myself any more, and I will explain why.
First, I find it hard to read through a lot of the content — not because I don’t like reading, which I love, but because the authors of it sometimes seem as though they only come to blow off steam about everything instead of searching for a useful solution to whatever is bothering them. The few times I do post there I try to be a voice of reason. I think a lot of the feelings I have about this come from that fact that I am much older than many there, so I have a different perspective on life and how small a lot of what they are so incensed about truly is in the scheme of things. I have bigger fish to fry.
Second I find it actually detrimental to the community I love in Home to be so full of anger about things that affect many of us if not all of us. The recent tirades about whether Home is going to be on the PS4 or not is a prime example. Look at it this way and try to put yourself in Sony’s shoes for a minute:
Sony’s revenue makers
You are a very large corporation and like all such companies you have stockholders to keep happy and employees to keep employed. You have a large inventory of diverse products that touch many realms of the market, from movie making and music to the products they are played on, from gaming to recording equipment and computers. All of these constitute the main sources of your income and are therefore your priority when it comes to your bottom line and keeping all of the aforementioned people happy.
Then there is this thing called Home. It is actually not much more than a small blip on your radar when it comes to making money and yet it is a place you have decided to support for over five years, many times at some cost to you rather than adding income because you decided to make it a free service, one among others, to help keep your customers happier and interested in your products. Some but not all of these customers have decided of their own free will to invest money into this free to play venture, and you are happy to help them do so by bringing interesting content of your own and through third party developers.
Then you have this group of customers who instead of being happy for the services you have provided, seem to be full of anger all of
What forum protesters seem like at times
the time; they rant and rave on the free forum that you yourself have provided them, rather than giving you a break when things go wrong or the time to even fix them. Everything needs to be done immediately, when Home is not really your major focus. You have provided many devoted employees to this free service, at cost to you, yet your customers seem to be so full of malice at times it makes you reconsider your decisions about this place.
How would you react to that? Would you even want to continue this free service to people you have provided? Would you want to consider adding it to the next generation console you have coming in the future? If it isn’t there and the PS3 is the end of the service that will eventually peter out in a few years, then so will all of the negative reactions and vitriol associated with it.
Now I am not saying that everyone in the forums does this; far from it. There are many voices there who are reasonable and tempered with logic and tact. I also think that the forums serve a good purpose for the most part, as they are there to give the customer a voice and that is always good for any business to do. The fact that Sony has done this shows they truly do care about keeping their customers 
happy; if they didn’t the forum wouldn’t even exist and our only choice when something goes wrong would be to call a customer service line.
What I do believe though is that when you consistently complain without trying to be a part of the solution, you become part of the problem. I know that Sony is a big company and perhaps they let these types of things roll off their backs like water off a duck, but the people that work there for Home might not have the same attitude. We have to remember there are people behind the names on that forum just like there are people behind each avatar in Home.
So be kind to one another; you get more flies with honey than vinegar.
March 19th, 2013 by Burbie52 | 3 comments
Burbie52 is a 62 year-old published author and founder of the Grey Gamers group within Home. Born and raised in Michigan, she has lived there her entire life, with the exception of a twelve-year residency on the Big Island of Hawaii. She enjoys reading and writing, as well as video games, especially RPG's. She has one son in his twenties.
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Great article Burbie. I see the forums in this way: a company like Sony, (and I don’t mean this with venom)probaby doesn’t care too much what the masses scream in the forums. I beleive they set it aside to listen to the root issues from the vioces that speak up, but like any public figure or company, there will always be the fringe that just rants…the president knows that, actors know that, artists know that, and I am sure that Sony knows this. Like public figures, there has to be some ignoring the screamers and listen to the calm headed minority. I think that the forums serve a great purpose of corraling the ranters in one pen. Instead of every forum troll having a page to say venomous things about Sony, it’s contained more or less. In fact we should applaud Sony, they recognize our freedom of speech and even gave and maintain a place for us to do it in, though some are rather nasty. I think that the forums are a two way street. Good and bad. It lets Sony hear about issues facing the users, but it also allows in the ragers.
The Forum is of value to me. The last few days I had some questions which I posted and I got reasonable answers from others including Joystick_Warrior while they had no out and out solutions, eased my mind. I feel more comfortable.
Communication and help of some sort whether from other Homies or Sony staff is at least a morale builder at times anyway.
Now as to the missing Stapler… but I haven’t been on the forums today.
Burbie I think you are spot on with this article. I don’t think any of us Mature Thinking People have a problem disagreeing with what Sony does. Our problem is with the blatant lack of regard for the fact that there are people that work hard to give us this service on the other end. Their livelihoods depend on our consumerism and so there is this forum so we can tell them how they are doing… but you know then there is a whole lotta bashing going on… which if I were on the other end and there was nothing constructive in the rant I would just by-pass…
Thanks for this one Burb- its well written.