Sony Computer Entertainment America announced today that it has been given top honors by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences as the recipient of a Technology and Engineering Emmy Award for the PlayStation 3's SIXAXIS controller. SCEA will accept this award at a presentation held tonight during the International Consumer Electronics Show 2007 in Las Vegas.

"The overwhelming consumer demand and critical acclaim for PS3 is a testament of the platform's strength and the industry's desire for a true next-generation entertainment system," said Jack Tretton president of SCEA. "The full potential of this powerful machine has yet to be realized — what you've seen so far is just a taste of what will be on the table for 2007 and years to come."

The SIXAXIS wireless controller features motion-sensing to detect body movements and interpret them into in-game actions. The PS3 will be on display during the International CES tradeshow, January 8-11, in the Sony Electronics Booth.

Currently these drivers allow you to connect your controller to the computer. However as these are NOT sony drivers the motion sensing will not work.

Here are the installation instructions:

When the PS3 was introduced many people were displeased with the controller design. Some were unhappy due to the fact that the rumble had been taken out, others felt that Sony had simply "copied" some of the ideas of another company, some people probably didn't care as long as the controller worked for their system. The fact of the matter is this, the SIXAXIS controller has received mixed responses.

A not-so-recent patent by Sony has been unearthed for all the world to see. The patent is for a remote input device for a gaming console. A note from the abstract:

An input device providing users with a pointing capability includes a sender portion and a receiver portion. The sender portion is adapted to be manipulated by a user to specify a target point within a target area. The sender portion projects a light beam including a pattern on to the target area. A receiver portion includes one or more sensor units located in or near the target area.

Sound familiar? Sounds like the a description of the Wiimote technology, but it's a Sony patent.

What are you're thoughts on this? You can discuss them here

The PlayStation 3 analyst hate train just keeps on rolling with research analyst Michael Comeau's latest piece. It's the typical fare, dogging Sony for their pricey inclusion of the PS3's Blu-ray drive and taking Sony to task for losing precious third-party exclusives (including the former time-exclusive Grand Theft Auto) like Guitar Hero and Virtua Fighter 5.

But Comeau's warning that Sony will lose market share combined with the fact that the PlayStation business has "provided more than 60% of Sony's operating profit despite hovering around 10% of overall Sony revenue" should give shareholders and Sony cause for concern.

Kotaku has a great piece up looking at trends over time in the PS3 grey market.

Michael Fahey has been tracking the falling prices for Sony's new console, via sales on eBay and other markets. He called around to stores as well, getting a feel for the number of returns and current availability of the console.

His conclusions:
"As it turns out my gamer instincts and the threat of hordes of angry readers steered me clear of potential disaster. Aside from a couple brief spikes, there is no way I'd have been able to pull off the television, and I know damn well I would have waited for Christmas like so many others did, only to lose even more. There's no such creature as a sure thing. The majority of eBay prospectors walked away from this experience with that lesson burned into the back of their brains. My suggestion for the future? If you want to gamble, go to Vegas. If you want to invest, try mutual funds. Leave the video game system buying to the gamers. We'll all be happier for it."

"Console launch years only come around twice a decade or so, and they're always guaranteed to be exciting years. The 360 matured dramatically since this time last year and its second-generation titles like Gears of War and CoD3 made the PlayStation 3's job of shocking the world with its immense power rather difficult.

Nintendo's Wii launched to massive mainstream applause and a lot of hope has been placed in the potential for gaming innovation via the console's unique controller. Nintendo disappointed some, however, by choosing not embrace HDTV or to compete with Sony and Microsoft in processing power. The Wii can't even play normal DVDs.

Judging the consoles based upon a broad perspective that includes software now available and coming in the future an entirely different argument could be formulated. However, from a hardware perspective, the PS3 is by far the more interesting console. Though the launch software hasn't blown anyone away, the 360's launch titles were equally unimpressive, and the system will certainly mature. Sony's embrace of the PS3 as a computer rather than just a console, and the availability of supported Linux distributions for the console will also develop and will likely bear entirely unexpected fruit in future.

Runner-Up:
Nintendo Wii"

PLAYSTATION 3