It’s a serious question; but I offer no serious answers. This is just for laughs, so if you have no sense of humour about the situation, begone! I have here a carefully (ahem) compiled list of potential suspects. Decide for yourselves who has the most to gain. WARNING: May contain Smurfs.
An international network of ignored wives and girlfriends
Every day, thousands – perhaps millions -of young men have the videogame/lady ratio all wrong. There’s nothing wrong with playing videogames, hell no; but some lads only acknowledge the existence of their wife/girlfriend when (a) they’re hungry, or (b) they’re hungry. This is it fellas; it’s finally happened.
Furious at being ignored and unappreciated, an international network of PlayStation widows has forced Sony to take PSN down by breaching security. Unfortunately, their timing was a little off. Rather than chasing killstreaks in Call of Duty, now their partners are all playing Portal 2; replaying Portal 2 to clean up the singleplayer trophies; playing Portal 2 a third time to enjoy the developer commentaries.
Pity those in a relationship with LittleBigPlanet fans. A hundred thousand unfinished LBP levels are being finished up and tinkered with as you read this. PSN will perhaps collapse almost as soon as it goes back up again under the weight of all those new levels being published at once.
Michael Pachter
We all know (don’t we?) that since disappearing from our TV screens in the death throes of the eighties, Gargamel (sworn enemy of the Smurfs) donned a pair of glasses and a toupee and insisted that everybody call him Michael Pachter. Though ostensibly a successful research analyst, this is of course just another elaborate ruse in pursuit of the Smurfs.
After decades of analysing the industry and its PR stunts, Pachter/Gargamel finally tracked down the Smurfs (all of whom have been completely addicted to videogames since the release of Assassin’s Creed II). They got sloppy; they got cocky. It was their deal with Ubisoft – publishers of their beloved Assassin’s Creed franchise – for a new Smurfs game that finally tipped him off. Everything fell into place. Of course – the Frag Dolls!
Gargamel
The Frag Dolls are not human, but brainless puppets. Each of the Dolls is little more than a clockwork mannequin, each one operated internally by precisely seventeen Smurfs. Until Ubisoft perfect their Smurf sized joypads (patent pending), the Dolls are the easiest way for Smurfs to play games.
Once this epiphany hit him, Gargamel retreated to his lair to cook up some potions, as he is wont to do. Inviting some Sony bigwigs over for lunch (and which Sony exec would turn down such an invite from “Michael Pachter”?), he slipped his new ‘Kill PSN Then Forget What You Did’ potion into their drinks. Et voila. He wanted to keep Xbox Live going so he still had a console to play Portal 2 and Red Dead Redemption on.
Knocking out one major games network was more than enough to enrage the Smurfs, however. Deprived of the opportunity to enjoy SOCOM 4 (which Pachter knew the Smurfs had been looking forward to for months), they became little blue balls of fury. It was obvious: Gargamel was onto them, and was determined to draw them out.
It’s now only a matter of time until the Smurfs discover Gargamel’s disguise, leave their Frag Doll shells, and exact their revenge. When PSN goes back up, that means Michael Pachter got his ass kicked by the Smurfs.
Prince William & Kate Middleton
Who has the power, the wealth, and the influence to bring down the PlayStation Network across the whole planet? Of course! It’s so obvious when you think about it. The English Royal Family.
As you know – and you do know, whether you want to or not – Prince William and Kate Middleton are getting married on Friday. Already, armies of tacky and unofficial merchandise have invaded the world. Banners, posters, stickers, cakes, biscuits, DVDs, magazines, books, flags, badges, even condoms. No, really – look it up if you must. But even though the great unwashed are making a fuss over the event with no provocation, it’s not enough.
Most people showing a genuine interest in the wedding are pensioners, the mentally ill, or mentally ill pensioners. The coveted 18-25 and 26-35 demographics certainly aren’t showing an interest, generally speaking. This simply will not do, in the royals’ opinion. How dare the plebs not believe the marriage of two people they will never meet is not a significant event in their lives!
Last week, William and Kate ordered the closure of the PlayStation Network. Don’t be surprised if Xbox Live and Steam follow in the next 24 hours. The theory of course is that with no internet play, millions more people will switch to watching TV – and therefore blanket coverage of the wedding. People will then realise that they do after all give a poop about the wedding; and will in fact be so overcome with joy at the couple’s happiness, that they also become fervent royalists.
This is no more than a desperate attempt to prevent the inevitable revolution, which will end with heads on spikes. The heads of the royal family and all who support them, lining the coast of mainland Britain as a warning to any monarchs foolish enough to think they can fill the bloodstained gap.
But enough of my gentle joshing. Which of these are the most likely culprits? Or do you have a better idea?
I did have a sense of humour about the PSN outage, until Sony announced that all users personal information, passwords and credit card details had been compromised.
http://faq.en.playstation.com/cgi-bin/scee_gb.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?locale=en_GB&p_faqid=5593
I just wanted to have a laugh before somebody empties my bank account, and my family and I are reduced to eating stale grass.
On a more serious note, we won’t know exactly how bad the situation is until somebody forces Sony’s hand to reveal more than they already have. They’re still being worryingly vague. Ask them how big a chance there is that credit card details have been stolen, and the reply will be something along the lines of ‘Erm, mumblemumblemumble’.
The fact that no hacker collective has claimed responsibility does, unfortunately, hint that it’s exactly this kind of informatiion that the hacker/hackers wanted. On the other hand, why PSN? Why not Xbox Live and/or Steam?
Who the hells knows – they could have had issues with STEAM! Of M$ could be trying some shit cuz they are jealous and they DONT have steam the wankers!
Stop saying hackers did it there is no proof!, you’re giving them to much credit for something that they did not do!, and there is no proof that anyones accounts have been stolen.
Although Sony have never used the term ‘hacker’ or ‘hackers’, they have confirmed that there was an ‘”outside intrusion” and that personal information has been compromised to some extent.
Please see the link provided by half_empty80 for proof.
Better explanations for what is going on compared to the crap spewed by Sony’s PR people. You should use this to apply for a PR spot at Sony.
Its been over a week now, and it’s still not back online. Amazing really.
Anyone for multiplayer gaming on their Wii?
I would Steven! But, I only have two friend codes – one of which is now offline. Strangely, the only way I’ve obtained friend codes, is through the PSN!!!
Anyways, I can’t say I’m too worried about my details getting nicked, mainly coz there’s nothing to steal from my account, but also coz (as stated above) there’s no real evedince that its happened yet… Yet. *ahem*
Fun reading this though, I’m pretty sure Gargamel could be behind all this as he did say he’d get them “If it’s the last thing I ever do” and when you put Patcher’s pic and Gargamel’s together like that, there is a striking similarity. I dunno, the Smufs usualy manage to land on their feet in these situations so who knows what’ll happen. I could have been Gremlins, hasn’t anyone at Sony HQ checked under their beds, or in their VCRs?