Mayor blames Sony for PS3 day of chaos

Speaking to the Boston Herald Menino spoke about the situation frankly, "We had to rush in 12 police cars with officers there and take them off the streets of our city where they're doing their patrols, to squelch the crowd that we had there" he said, referring to a crowd of 500 at a local mall.

"It's something that should not be tolerated" he said. "It's wrong to take advantage of the public that way, wrong by the manufacturer and by the retailer."

"The mayor feels this is a ploy by big business to fill the pockets of their stockholders on the public's back without any regard for public safety" said a spokeswoman, for Menino.

The local Best Buy store at the mall had refused to take into account a list that had been created by customers in line, but were subsequently forced to by police.

"The store said our list was meaningless; it's going to be a mad rush, and whoever gets through the doors first gets one" said one queuing customer. Elsewhere, mobs of customers stampeded into stores, injuring a man in Wisconsin and forcing authorities to close a Wal-Mart in California.

In Connecticut, two armed thugs tried to rob a line of people outside a Wal-Mart and a prospective PS3 owner refused to give up his money and was subsequently shot. He was in stable condition yesterday at hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

Sony spokesman Dave Karraker said that the chaos "It's not something we planned or foresaw," he said, but even the mainstream media understood that this was a likely outcome with the Herald writing, "If Sony didn't, nearly everyone else seemed to know that limited supplies and high demand were a formula for trouble." µ

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