A confession: I’m not all that likely to use my PlayStation 3 online now that the PlayStation Network’s back. Because I’m upset with Sony about the PSN fiasco? Nope. Because I wasn’t all that likely to use it before the hacker tsunami hit (nothing to do with the service, which is great, but because I’ve never been much for competitive gaming anyway).
All of which makes me part of the 4 percent “somewhat unlikely” to continue using the PSN after service is restored, in a survey that concludes PlayStation brand and service loyalty remain mostly unfazed by the PSN outage.
The survey was conducted by GameSpot’s “industry-research division,” dubbed GameSpot Trax. They surveyed 2,285 GameSpot users online, presumably restricting the ability to vote by user account, and managed to score well above standard optimal respondent rates, keeping the margin of error relatively low.
(More on PCWorld: PlayStation Network Users are Fed Up, But Not Ready to Jump Ship)
Asked how the PSN security breach impacted player feelings about Sony and the PSN, 35 percent of respondents said their trust had “not been affected,” 28 percent said that while they still trust Sony, they’ll change “the amount of information [they] share,” 23 percent said they actually trusted Sony more because “the breach will force [Sony] to impose tighter controls,” and just 14 percent said they no longer trusted Sony or the PSN.
Has PSN use been impacted by the outage? Not really, according to the results, which have 81 percent either “very” or “somewhat” likely to continue using the PSN, followed by 10 percent “undecided,” and just 9 percent “somewhat” or “very” unlikely.
That said, users were split over Sony’s handling of the incident. A majority (57 percent) felt it was handled appropriately, while a sizable minority (43 percent) felt it wasn’t. Sony was slow to react publicly to the outage, though it said the delay was intentional and arguably appropriate as it sought to gather accurate information before divulging details (and, eventually, apologies).
That supposed wagon train of PSN users trundling over to Microsoft’s Xbox LIVE? Not happening, according to the results, which have 75 percent “very” or “somewhat” unlikely to switch, followed by 13 percent “undecided,” 5 percent “somewhat” or “very” likely to switch, and 9 percent who say they already have.
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