The Parliament of Ghosts

Q: What can I get from the PlayStation Network Expanded Welcome Back Program?

A: In light of the community’s goodwill and understanding during this extended downtime, all PSN members, not just those who signed up before the outage began on April 20th, 2011, will be awarded a free error screen. This error screen will say “An error has occurred. (80710D36)” and appear whenever the user tries to access the PSN.  For many, the screen will look like this:

Though there are other, secret error screens (all with the same message) hidden throughout the PSN interface! Can you find them all?

Q: What about those games I was promised?

A: Redemption of the two free games, free month of PlayStation Plus membership, and other benefits detailed in the welcome back program is on hold for now to allow everyone to enjoy this unannounced bonus screen. As there are over 70 million subscribers to the PlayStation Network, we cannot handle the load of everyone attempting to simultaneously view this error screen and download about 2 gigabytes of data. In fact, there is no way we could possibly let everyone download their free games all at once, and it would have been foolish of us not to expect every single person to attempt to redeem their gift within hours of the program’s rollout. Instead, a select few will be permitted into the PlayStation Store to receive their free subscriber gift every few hours, chosen totally at random.

Q: Something went wrong, I can’t see the error screen!

A: Have you tried doing anything at all with the PlayStation Network? Many features of the PlayStation 3 do not actually require a connection to the PlayStation Network. To redeem your free error screen, please use any feature that requires a connection to the PlayStation Network, such as the PlayStation Store.

Q: Do I only get one error screen?

A: No! Sony understands how important these error screens are to the community, and rather than risk some users failing to receive this Welcome Back gift, we have decided to allow the user to access this error screen whenever they wish, simply by connecting to the PlayStation Network or PlayStation Store!

Q: What if I get a different error number?

A: That indicates an actual error occurring with your PlayStation 3 console, and is not part of the welcome back program. For example, error 80023102 indicates that you have tried to redeem your regular Welcome Back gift early. To dissuade this behavior, anyone receiving this error will lose one of their other welcome back gifts, seemingly at random.

Q: What about error number 8002A4A6?

A: This error code indicates you have Type II Diabetes.

Q: When will this special welcome back promotion end?

A: It is unknown at this time how long the promotion will last, but rest assured our announcements of its duration will be vague and largely unsatisfying!

Q: Hey, that guy in your commercials, is he…you know?

A: You mean the guy who looks like if Jim Gaffigan went to business school?

Q: Yeah, him.

A: What about him?

Q: It’s just, me and my friend had a bet, and we were wondering if he, uh, experiences error code 69ADUDE, if you know what I mean?

A: Unfortunately, it is Sony policy not to release personal information, with the exception of the information of our 70 million users, which is available to any teenager who posts on 4chan.