Playstation Home

Sorry, no cheesy puns. There's plenty of that already on other blogs.
I actually got an invite to the closed Home beta a couple of weeks ago. I downloaded it and installed it that same day, but when I attempted to log in I just got an error message. I didn't think about it again until 2 days ago when I read that they were going into open beta. I also read that there was stuff that you can get for free in the closed beta that you wouldn't be able to get after it opened up. I'm all for free stuff, so I tried again, this time I was able to log in. I ended up in my 'home' which is basically a single room with some furniture. I followed the tutorial and eventually ended up in the mall where there are 3 or 4 stores where you can purchase viritual stuff. I picked up the summer house and all of the furniture and clothes that were available. First thought: you have to buy stuff. With real money. Virtual stuff. I'll let that sink in. Now, I'm not adverse to paying for digital goods. I play online games where the accumilation of virtual stuff is the primary goal. I justify that cost as time spent on a passtime that I enjoy, the 'stuff' is secondary. Kind of a bonus for playing well or accomplishing things.
This is just... stuff. In the true culture of North American life, its spending money on things. Possesions that have no real purpose other than to show off to other people that also value useless stuff.
The whole home thing just seems pointless. Why would I spend real money on virutal stuff that doesn't do anything? The whole thing just seems like a huge marketing platform for game companies and even non game corporations to hawk their goods (virtual ones as well as real). They have Red Bull as a sponsor already. Now, as far as I know Red Bull doesn't make games for the PS3. I guess they can be loosely related to games in that gamers probably are a big segement of their target demographic, but all it does in my mind is show the true purpose of the Home environment, to advertise crap. There's little else that you can do in it right now. theres a couple of places where you can play chess, or watch some video. But even those 'activites' are marketing oriented, the area where you can play chess is surrounded by posters for games.
I dunno, maybe theres great plans afoot to make it more compelling, but right now its pretty dull, and the feeling that its just there to bombard you with ads is very strong. I doubt I will be spending much time in Home at all.