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Rumor: Playstation Network Removing Accounts Made from Unsupported Countries?

On Pinoyxbox's "PXB Taksil! Thread" (PS3 users thread), it was reported that Playstation Network (PSN) accounts made by gamers living in the Philippines are being suspended by Sony.

From Holocause on the Pinoyxbox forums:

"From what I've been reading, the potential reasons could be from:

Falsifying your identity... stating that your living in Japan when your IP clearly show's your not.

Making multiple accounts from a single PS3. You have 1 account for the PSN server in Japan, another account for the US server etc... etc...

Probably got complained to by someone (bad feedback)

Game sharing... purchasing content from the PSN store and then giving them away for free to 5 other buddies on your friendslist

Joining up for PSN from a region that is not supported by PSN

These ofcourse are unfounded right now and are just rumors as to why the block. Nothing to confirm them. Its similar rin I think as to the grounds of how XBL blocks-off content from users. Difference kasi with Live users I think kasi is that we're paying customers so they don't Ban us unless we violate 'Terms of use', they just block off content that we shouldn't have access to."

This is a really unfortunate development for gamers in unsupported countries like mine. Actually, the Xbox 360 also almost had a similar incident before, when rumors swirled that Microsoft's newest update would remove accounts in unsupported countries from Xbox Live.

(Very old thread) Philippine-based XBL Users Threatened By Incoming Update!


Luckily, the gamers from unsupported countries (in particular, Greece, which was then unsupported) rallied together and informed Microsoft that it would be detrimental for them if their service became so strict with the enforcement of regions. In the end, thankfully, Microsoft's update did not harm gamers with accounts from unsupported places.

Right now this story still classifies as a rumor, since there are some other gamers who are from the Philippines but are able to get in PSN. This news story will never make it to Kotaku or Joystiq or any of those major gaming news sites/blogs because it hardly affects them at all. I think imposing regional restrictions on console gaming networks limits the potential growth for the console gaming markets in unsupported countries. The truth is, once console hardware leaves the factory, who knows where it gets shipped and how it gets there. Gaming has players from around the world and not just in supported countries; and while the markets in unsupported places are relatively small, they're still customers, and I think they all deserve some degree of good online service from game console manufacturers. At the end of the day, they're customers who can end up buying more software from game companies via online services---why close that out as a potential source of profits? Online services are part and parcel of this generation of game systems; it's part of the hefty sum that gamers pay for when they buy game consoles, and I think that gamers shouldn't be deprived of the ability to access them.

We'll try to find out more about the PSN issue and post it here once we get more information.

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