Last month, Sony's PlayStation Network senior director Susan Pamico remarked that the launch of PlayStation Home this fall will be similar to Gmail's own launch, and that the release will be an open, working beta. Some gamers are worried that the launch may be some half-baked attempt to show something to gamers after so many delays.

PSN Director Eric Lempel clarifies on this though, and it should quiet any fears. Lempel says Home, even in its initial release to the public, will not be presenting the service in its raw form, but rather a fully "robust" service:

If you think about Gmail and Susan’s reference, Gmail when it launched in beta was a fully functional email service. I personally was using it and it offered everything you’d expect, but was in beta just to say that there’s more to come and maybe it’s not fully polished.

The reason we’ve been delaying [Home] is so that we can deliver a high quality service that the users will enjoy. Even though it will be in beta, it will be a fair representation of what the service can be and its potential, so it won’t be a 0.5 release, it will be a fully robust service.

Lempel goes on to talk about the movie download service coming for the PlayStation 3. He does confirm that the service is still a go for launch this Summer in the US, although he can't "speak for the other regions at this time":

I don’t have any more specifics right now, but like Kaz [Hirai] said, it will go live [in the US] this summer and I think it will offer consumers everything they’re looking for from us. It will offer everything they expect from us and probably a little bit more.