Earlier this week, SCEA sent an email around to PlayStation Underground members with reference to all Qore customers getting access to the PlayStation Home Extended Beta in Episode 6. The email originally stated that users who purchase Qore episode 6, but do not subscript would also get access to the beta, however, this is not the case anymore. In another email sent today, SCEA has stated that "special invitation to PlayStation Home’s closed beta is available only to Qore annual subscribers who purchased subscriptions by 10/29. Qore Episode 06 purchasers will not be eligible for the special PlayStation(R)Home beta invitation at this time."

This is no doubt bad news to anyone who wanted to take part in PlayStation Home, but is not a Qore subscriber. As you can see from the email, the deadline to subscribe has already passed. If you did not subscribe in time then you can kiss the Home Beta goodbye!

Original Email:

"As an update to the PLAYSTATION(R)3 News email sent on Friday,
October 24th, the special invitation to PlayStation(R)Home’s closed
beta is available only to Qore annual subscribers who purchased
subscriptions by 10/29. Qore Episode 06 purchasers will not be
eligible for the special PlayStation(R)Home beta invitation at
this time. We apologize for the miscommunication.

Participation in PlayStation(R)Home’s closed beta is limited to
those 18 years and older and requires agreement with the
PlayStation(R)Home Beta Trial."

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We secretly opened up the PSP M4M Website a few days ago and we noticed that some of you have already started to register. Today, we officially announce the launch of the beta website to everyone. We have been working hard with the beta testers for the past month and are now ready to launch the website for everyone to try out.

Of course, as the website is in the beta stage, you can expect things to change over the next few months as we add new features, tweak old one and open up new parts of the website for testing. As always, your suggestions are welcome. If you would like to see something added to the website (be it a gallery, video or new feature) or something changed, drop us an email and we will try and implement what we can.

[Visit PSP M4M]

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The new PlayStation Portable media player has been launched by Sony, adding PlayStation Store support and other changes. The new version of Media Manager allows you to organize and sync your music, photos and other digital content. The media manager will allow you to download and manage content purchased from the PlayStation Store and is available to download free from here.

Eric Lempel’s post on the PlayStation.Blog states:

"Today we are launching a new version of Media Manager for the PSP that allows you to organize and sync your music, photos and other digital content. The new media manager also grants access to the PlayStation Store through the PC and is designed to accommodate the expanding functionality of PSP. With the recent PSP firmware (v 5.01) update which gives you direct access to the PlayStation Store and the new media manager you have multiple ways to get content and manage it.

The new Media Manager is available as a free download at http://store.playstation.com.

Consumers who own the retail version of Media Manager (v2.5) will be able to upgrade to the online version of Media Manager PRO (v3.0) for free. To download the new media manager go to http://store.playstation.com."

Walkthrough Video:

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Anthony Rose, head of Online Media Group, BBC Future Media & Technology, has revealed that a PS3 specific version of the popular iPlayer is in the works. With the recent Adobe Flash Player update for the PS3, it is now possible for the BBC Flash Developers to make a PS3-compatible version, through there are some compatibility issues. Some European Gamers are already enjoying BBC channels using the recently released PlayTV tuner for the PlayStation 3, but the new iPlayer will further expand the userbase.

Anthony Rose said:

"We’re… working on bringing BBC iPlayer to Sony PS3, but we’re not quite there yet as the PS3 uses a slightly older version of Flash which doesn’t support some of the features used in our media player, and the very promising Flash 9 update now available on PS3 has some compatibility issues.

Our Flash developers are working on it."

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The recent PlayStation 3 firmware update has made many improvements to the PlayStation 3 System Software, and especially the Internet Browser. It’s taken some time, but Adobe Flash Player 9 has finally been integrated into the PS3. Some would argue that it’s a little too late as Adobe Flash Player 10 is now available to download. According to IGN, "Sony has actually been working on Flash 9 support for quite some time — as far back as late last year. To get it running on the PS3, Sony ended up customizing a separate Flash implementation that was provided to it by Adobe."

IGN also reports:

"For a sense of how computationally intensive some areas of Flash 9 can be, you need only consider this little bit. According to Takase, the PS3 implementation of Flash-based playback for H.264 videos makes use of an SPU. This allows for loading up of web pages to be separate from video playback, improving framerate.

The entire web experience on the PS3 has been improved with the new firmware update. Noda cited a 2.8 times increase in Javascript speed according to Sony’s own benchmarks. Takase believes PS3’s Javascript performance, while not up to the level of Google Chrome, beats Internet Explorer 7."

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[Via: IGN]

LittleBigPlanet is already out in North America and will soon be released in Europe and the UK. However, even before the game hit US stores, Media Molecule have been working on the sequel. The development of a sequel has been confirmed by BBC News’ technology editor, Darren Waters, in a piece that salutes Guildford’s developing houses, Media Molecule and Lionhead Studios, for coming out with games that are distinctly British, but universal in appeal. Says Waters on the LBP sequel, "Even before the game has hit the shops, the team are already at work on a sequel."

There is no doubt that LittleBigPlanet will be a massive hit – most of you will have heard the stories around the beta code giveaways causing websites to crash due to the large amount of traffic. Media Molecule have not revealed any details about the sequel, and we specualte that they won’t release any information for at least a few months.

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In a recent email sent out by SCEA to PlayStation Underground members, Sony has revealed that those who purchase Qore Episode 6 and annual subscribers will receive access to the PlayStation Home Beta. Subscribers will be sent a beta key after downloading (or purchasing) the issue. The episode will be available to purchase from Thursday, November 6th 2008. With this news, it’s clear that PlayStation Home isn’t going to be released to the public any time soon.

We speculate that PlayStation Home will be released to the public sometime in December. If you are not already an annual subscriber, the episode will cost you $2.99, or you can subscribe for $24.99.