The veritable genius of economic theory that he is, Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer has finally figured out a flaw in his grand scheme of world domination via the PS3: that hefty pricetag. "If we fail, it is because we positioned PS3 sales as the Mercedes of the videogame field," said Stringer. "PS3 is a different audience and it can be whatever it wants – a home server, game device, even a computer." It seems odd that he'd say the PS3 is limited to a different audience and that it can be "whatever it wants" in the same sentence, but who are we to judge? Stringer also praised the Wii as "a wonderful device," and stated that it "has a different target audience" than that of the PS3. Nothing new there, and his statements on the format war were also unsurprising: "We are selling 3-to-1 versus to them," he said. "At some point Blu-ray will take over based on ... this support." Good to see some things just never change.

Making it perfectly clear that even the mightiest CEOs sit up at night fretting over their competitors' products, his highness Sir Howard Stringer recently confessed to having an "obsession" with Microsoft's Xbox 360 after inadvertently mentioning the PS3-rival in an interview with the Wall Street Journal's Walt Mossberg. Stringer's admission followed what can only be described as a classic Freudian slip, in which he substituted the words "Xbox 360" for "X-Men III" when bragging about the success of Sony Pictures' The Da Vinci Code. After some prodding from Mossberg, Stringer even went on to pay Microsoft founder Bill Gates something of a backhanded compliment, admiring Gates' ability to put a positive spin on setbacks like the constantly-slipping Vista release date while still managing to take shots at the PS3 for its own delayed arrival. So, the obvious question that now presents itself is: who would win in a fight, Gates or Stringer? Comments are on and awaiting your thoughtful analysis.

Sony seems to have decided that the traditional one-size-fits-all bathtub is ripe for a rethink, so the company has filed a patent application for a tub that can be reshaped based on an owner's needs. Basically, it works like the detention-level trash compactor; press a button and the walls of the tub close in or slide out, resulting in a wide and shallow tub, or a narrow and deep one. We knew Sony was scrapping some lines of business, and exploring others that might show more potential, but we had no idea they were going in this direction. Maybe Sir Howard just likes to take a good soak, and wants to make sure he can do so in a brand-loyal manner.