:: They don't want Supply to be low, especially not when the demand is highest. That's why it would make no sense for them to purposefully lower the amount of consoles available to make a tiny bit of money.
Not necessarily.
Let's look at it the Viacvian way: Sony could make more PS3s and put them out if they really wanted to because they're big enough, so why don't they?"
Right now, they have no competition. 360 is already out and established, and Revolution is still a ways off, so they have the Shiny New Toy market right now. They are the only Shiny New Toy, and will be for a while. As long as they are the only Shiny New Toy, they have the market cornered.
Sony is taking a hit on every unit; printer manufacturers take a hit on every unit. Printer companies earn profit on ink, Sony must earn profit on game sales. To sell games, you need game contracts. You need to tell game studios you have a strong, enduring product. One that will create a large userbase to buy lots of games.
Which sounds better:
"We sold out opening day, and now we move a few units every week."
"We've sold out every day for the first month! People camp out in line before stores open for the first two weeks! We're on the news because of the media frenzy! People are paying sixteen grand to get a console to play YOUR NEW BLOCKBUSTER GAME, {EA/Ubisoft/whatever}!"
We've discovered something. Sony makes PS3 look bigger than it is, by abusing metrics of popularity. PS3 (artificially) sells out every day, starting from release until they eventually satiate the market. PS3 gets on TV, newspapers, and Goldeneye Source Forums. Sony doesn't care about making money off of PS3 and we know this because they sell at a loss, so I ask you, nowhere, why wouldn't they want to have low supply when demand is high? They sell more they LOSE MORE because each unit is -$300! They want to choke sales and spread those losses out over the coming weeks, while buiding investment in Buzz, Popularity, and Attention from the mass media, so they can get the game studios to sign exclusives to Sony and not to Nintendo, who's known for going for exclusive contracts and using them to dominate whenever possible.
Remember, they are the only Shiny New Toy on the market, and will be until Revolution comes around the corner. Their best strategy is to exploit their solitary position to get the contracts and distribute their losses, so when Revolution comes out, PS3 will have the game catalogue to stay competitive.
At least, that's what I think.
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