For most of today, Sony’s PlayStation Network has been turning away users of older PS3 consoles with ‘8001050F’ error codes, which is normally not a good thing. This error locks users out of the PSN, and can in some cases corrupt trophy data and paid DLC content, which would make those users quite angry, needless to say. All of this can cause random game lockups, among other symptoms.

In an odd symptom reported as well, PS3s that have not connected to the internet either for years are finding their clocks being set to 12/31/1999 for some weird reason. This is causing some games that check to this sort of thing not to function correctly, even if they don’t need a net connection to work normally.

Sony’s Twitter reply to all of this? Here it is: “We’re aware that many of you are having problems connecting to PSN, and yes, we’re looking into it. Stay tuned for updates.” Not much info, hopefully this all gets fixed sooner rather than later, lest angry PS3 gamers storm the gates of Sony in protest.

Another curious note: newer “flat design” PS3’s aren’t affected, it seems.