IGN's PS2 channel has word that the Sony PlayStation 2 has reached a new milestone: ninety million units shipped. That's a lot of PlayStations. Here's a little food for thought regarding numbers. Taking the US Census Bureau's population projections and figures for the estimated total world population (approximately 6,444,960,515 people as of June 1, 2005) that puts a PS2 in the hands of approximately 1.4% of everyone on Earth. Five years and three months were needed to reach that level.
Remember at E3 when Microsoft projected/boasted that they would have one billion customers during the Xbox 360 generation? Assuming that each of those one billion people has their own console (no sharing), Microsoft is aiming to turn 15.5% of the world's population into Xbox 360 owners. Now, if we assume that each Xbox 360 console is shared by three people that puts a console in the homes of 5.2% of the world's population. These calculations are based on June 2005 population estimates instead of launch window November 2005 estimates and beyond, but it's clear that Microsoft has extremely high hopes for the next generation of game consoles.
And, as Slashdot says, if you're using these numbers to do anything important, you're insane.
Feel free to double-check my math:
- PS2 percentage = [(total PS2s shipped) / (June 2005 population)] * 100
- Xbox 360 single user percentage = [(one billion consumers) / (June 2005 population)] * 100
- Xbox 360 three users percentage = [(one billion consumers / 3) / (June 2005 population)] * 100
