PSP- converged piece of technology

PlayStation Portable- converged portable techonology
PSP (PlayStation Portable)


Units sold
Worldwide: 24.70 million units

The PlayStation Portable is a handheld game console released and manufactured by Sony Computer Entertainment.

Functions:
Game console
Music Player- store and play
Film Player- can buy or download films to watch
Photo- storage and view
Internet- allows users to stream live television broadcasts or other video content to their PSP, within their WiFi network, or remotely via the internet.
Wi-Fi- allows two ore more players with PlayStation portables to create a local, ad-hoc network for multiplayer gameplay, and also allows the a PSP user to connect to the internet via an internet-connected Wi-Fi router.
RSS features allow the user to download video web feeds or listen to podcasts from websites
Camera Attachment- Chotto Shot Camera and GPS attachment, the Quick Shot is a camera add-on which supports video and photo taking.

Features:
Ad-hoc networks allows for up to 16 PlayStation Portables within range to communicate directly to each other (typically for multi player gaming). One acts as the host for a game which is available to other PlayStation Portable units within that system’s range.
Game sharing
Firmware- direct download to the PSP over Wi-Fi, download to a PC

Colours
PlayStation Portable is currently available in 6 colors: black, ceramic white, pink, metallic blue, silver, and champagne. This therefore will make this portable appeal more as they can pick a colour to suit them.

Technology it is replacing
Old style portable game console e.g. Game Boy
Music players
Cameras
Portable DVD players

Theory
Convergence- merging of different technologies
Portability- small enough to be carried around
Miniaturisation
Convenience- lots of different technologies merged together which can be carried around for your convenience

Vertical intergration- users of Playstation and PS2 may feel loyal to the brand to buy this portable device

Downloading music- new media activity

Downloading music

What it is replacing
Music downloads have been replacing the buying on CD albums and singles. They have become such a large part of music that they are now included in the music charts when deciding the positioning of songs.

Why so popular with audiences?
Audiences can get the music easily from the internet for free e.g. Limewire or at a cheap cost e.g. iTunes, the music transfers directly to your PC and can be played immediately and transferred onto your mp3. You can download the music in the comfort of your home instead of going out to buy it or buying the CD on the internet and waiting for it to arrive. This therefore makes it convenient and flexible to audiences, which I think along with being free to download has been the main reason for its success. Downloading music appeals to people who do not want the whole album but only a few tracks on the artist. Downloading has become most popular with the young- teenagers and young adults as they have less money to spend on music and are techno savvy to know how to actually download music.

Relating to institutions
Positives
‘There are currently 300 legal digital music websites, three times as many as existed a year ago. Digital music services have registered 2.2m subscribers around the world, which is up from 1.5m in January. The two most popular are iTunes, offering 1.5m tracks and Napster, which offers 1.2m.’ Jul 25, 2005 PASSAGE FROM BBC NEWS ARTICLE

Negatives
Big record labels have seen their sales slide precipitously in the past several years, and have blamed the falling revenue in large part on rampant free music downloads online. Others have pointed to additional factors, such as lower household spending during the recession, and increased competition from other entertainment forms such as DVDs and video games, each of which have grown over the same time period.

Theory
Convenience- can all be done in the comfort of your home

Immediacy- transfers straight to your pc