PlayStation and several other Sony brands went largely quiet on social media from 1 July, the day the company announced it would cease production of physical game discs from 2028. The decision triggered immediate and widespread backlash that spilled across nearly all of Sony's social media accounts, including those unrelated to gaming, making it a significant moment of public relations tension for the firm. The matter matters because it feeds a broader anxiety among players that digital-only libraries leave them without genuine ownership of the games and media they buy.

When PlayStation resumed posting on Tuesday to promote its new wireless FlexStrike fight stick, the reaction was overwhelmingly hostile rather than focused on the product. Within the first two hours, the post on X drew over 30,000 replies and nearly 9,000 quotes, while the Instagram version attracted more than 6,000 angry comments, none of which appeared to engage with the fight stick's features. Much of the anger was intensified by Sony having pulled more than 500 films from PlayStation libraries only days before the disc announcement, reinforcing fears that digital "ownership" can be revoked at any time; an online petition urging Sony to reverse course has passed 175,000 signatures, and the company has still not acknowledged or responded to the backlash.