During an interview with GameBusiness.jp, Naoya Matsui, head of Sony product planning, said that a UMD-less PSP was always the idea Sony had for the portable system.  "We'd planned to release a PSP model without a UMD drive since the very beginning, but if we'd simply released the hardware, there wouldn't have been much for everyone to enjoy." That is because the online PlayStation sphere wasn't in place and downloadable games just was not that norm for gamers. Thanks guys for going the UMD route!  Now I can have a bunch of useless plastic when I grab the system you really wanted to make in the first place. Next Sony will announce they hold the cure for Swine Flu, but not everyone would understand that they may need it or "get" their distribution system.