You should research the Yellow Ring of Death on Google. It is VERY real. Also Sony HAS to eventually go to a pay model. You'll see. They have no choice. They lowered the price from the $600 asking price in the beginning. That type of massive infrastructure has COST and SOMEONE has to pay for it. Believe me, they are not going to continue to eat the cost for that. Believe what you want if it makes you feel better, but don't say I didn't tell you so when it happens.
What MASSIVE infrastructure? They let the developers use their own for gaming servers and what not. That's why Microsoft's is so big, the 3rd party's can't do that like they can for Sony. Similar to how it was done on the PS2.