In a utopian future, people would pay the actual cost of manufacturing the console - plus a reasonable profit margin. Anyone could write games - and the cost of them would be reduced because they wouldn't have to pay the "Sony Tax" on each one. For people who'll own very few games over the life of the console, this is not so attractive - but for people who buy more than the average number of games, it's a huge win. But at least we're honest about it.
I already live in that future. I have a console hooked to my TV that runs code that doesn't have to be signed by Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, et al. I can also run multiple OSes on it without having to jailbreak it. And I have hundreds* of legally-purchased games to play on it that probably cost me less than what 20 new PS3/360 games would (at $60).
It's called an HTPC. It pretty much does everything a PS3/360 does better (including blu-ray playback). Not to mention backwards-compatibility with at least a dozen of older consoles via emulators. I still have my PS3, but primarily for GT5 and not much else.
*My Steam account alone has 300+ titles. Mostly bought through holiday sale packs at a huge discount. I've probably played less than half so far, but I'm still discovering games that I bought more than a year ago.
Factorials were someone's attempt to make math LOOK exciting.