To many PSN users, talk of “subscription fees” is a dreadful thing to dicuss; take a recent near-miss from a Sony investor slide mentioning a “new revenue stream from subscription” for example. The issue just won’t die, however, and an interview [thanks CVG] with the VP of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc’s Strategy Planning Department Masayuki Chatani revealed that the company is considering many different ways to monetize PSN.

“Servers and the like have running costs, and we would face difficulties if our business depended solely on the sell-and-forget model. After we sell the hardware, though, we continue to sell products such as content and services,” said Chatani. “We expect to see considerable growth in digital content, such as game download services, avatar items and the like.”

“We can also accept payment in a growing number of ways. In addition to single-payment packaged software, there are also schemes like monthly fees or per-item charges,” he added. ”I think this variety of payment methods will bring about a diverse range of playing methods, too.”

While Chatani seems to be talking in theoretical terms here, there are many possible elements the plan could include, like games supported by micro-payments, the upcoming subscription MMO titles from Sony Online Entertainment and virtual items for customization; it does not appear that he’s talking about attaching fees to services that have heretofore been free, at least not yet.