Uploaded September 2026 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago
The PlayStation Blackout is over, and according to Circana, Sony didn't feel a thing. Circana executive director Mat Piscatella said there was no significant change at all in player count or engagement in their US tracking, which is a pretty brutal answer to a protest that asked people to stop logging in, stop playing, and stop spending on PlayStation entirely.
Quick recap for anyone who missed it: Sony announced in July that new PlayStation games will stop getting physical disc releases starting in January 2028. Preservation group DoesItPlay organized a week-long #PSBlackout from August 23 to 30 to show Sony what reduced engagement looks like. And based on the tracking data, it looks like Sony's usual strategy of waiting out the anger worked again.
So in this one I'm getting into what the Circana data actually measures, why the blackout was probably doomed from the scheduling alone, what it says about collectors who complain loudly and then log back in on day eight, and whether there was ever a version of this protest that could have worked. Because I'm not convinced the answer is "nothing," and I'm definitely not convinced the disc fight is over.
Physical media, game ownership, resale, lending, preservation, and the slow death of actually owning the thing you paid for. Same fight we've been having about arcades, cartridges, and everything else on this channel.
Tell me in the comments: did you participate in the blackout? Did you last the full week? And is there anything that would actually make Sony blink?
Sources:
Circana / Mat Piscatella engagement data via TwistedVoxel: twistedvoxel.com/ps-blackout-player-engagement
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All music and video used are the property of their respective owners.
Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976: allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational, or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."
The PlayStation Blackout is over, and according to Circana, Sony didn't feel a thing. Circana executive director Mat Piscatella said there was no significant change at all in player count or engagement in their US tracking, which is a pretty brutal answer to a protest that asked people to stop logging in, stop playing, and stop spending on PlayStation entirely.
Quick recap for anyone who missed it: Sony announced in July that new PlayStation games will stop getting physical disc releases starting in January 2028. Preservation group DoesItPlay organized a week-long #PSBlackout from August 23 to 30 to show Sony what reduced engagement looks like. And based on the tracking data, it looks like Sony's usual strategy of waiting out the anger worked again.
So in this one I'm getting into what the Circana data actually measures, why the blackout was probably doomed from the scheduling alone, what it says about collectors who complain loudly and then log back in on day eight, and whether there was ever a version of this protest that could have worked. Because I'm not convinced the answer is "nothing," and I'm definitely not convinced the disc fight is over.
Physical media, game ownership, resale, lending, preservation, and the slow death of actually owning the thing you paid for. Same fight we've been having about arcades, cartridges, and everything else on this channel.
Tell me in the comments: did you participate in the blackout? Did you last the full week? And is there anything that would actually make Sony blink?
Sources:
Circana / Mat Piscatella engagement data via TwistedVoxel: twistedvoxel.com/ps-blackout-player-engagement
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
✅ Support the channel / become a member
Become a member to get access to exclusive perks: members-only livestreams, early videos, and behind-the-scenes updates:
youtube.com/channel/UC7E0dGyMoi1K2dutiifLo5Q/join
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
💼 Business / product reviews
If you’d like me to review your product(s) or for any business inquiry, email:
jameshateseverything2020@gmail.com
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🔗 Follow me / more content
Instagram: instagram.com/jameshateseverything
X (Twitter): https://x.com/HatesJames32769
Facebook: facebook.com/JamesHatesEverything
Threads: threads.com/@jameshateseverything
Live & VOD Gameplay Channel: youtube.com/@JHE_Plays
Everything AI related: youtube.com/@James-On-AI
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
📌 Disclaimers
All music and video used are the property of their respective owners.
Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976: allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational, or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."
