Oh I almost forgot RE: PS3 tommorow

Firmware incoming : what does this one do? No, not the new PSN store design (yet) , this one merges PS Vita and PS3 trophies together on the PS3 , among other stuff. (with Sony there is always hidden features) . so turn on your PS3 and hit the update button.

It's been so long since they have added a feature that was meaningful.
Wonder if ditching Life with PlayStation frees up any OS RAM...seems like they wouldn't get rid of it for no reason. Maybe they can sneak some more RAM to devs.

It's unlikely to free up any RAM as Life was an install and it was only a link included on the XMB. What could potentially free up some memory in future is the removal of the PSN Store. As the new Store (available in EMEGBA only up to now) is an installable program, it means the old store embedded in the firmware will no longer be required. The new store links in to the firmware based store for things like account management, adding credit, download list etc but this could just be an interim measure whilst they transition. Once the switch has been made globally, theoretically they could remove all the front end of the old PSN store and just leave the account management element in the firmware, thus freeing up space in the memory for developers.

However, with the news last night that the PS3 firmware has been cracked wide open again with the release of the lvl0 security keys, that space could well be taken up by new security measures. See http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-ps3-the-final-hack for more info. To clarify, this is the console firmware and NOT PSN accounts that have been cracked. Though it does mean that now hacked devices are able to access the PSN unlike previously.... until Sony come up with a work around.

As for new features; Europe gets Singstar added to the PS3 XMB tomorrow which has now gone Free To Play (not sure if it comes to NA immediately). By free they mean the body of the game is free but all songs are charged as per usual. The new twist is that they have added support for the Playstation Eye, meaning that more people will likely play it without the need for special costly microphones. They want it to become another gaming "service" rather than a standalone title, hence putting it as a permanent feature on the XMB.