We knew it was coming, we just weren’t sure when.

Today my inbox was delighted to receive the official email from PSN regarding the return of the PSN store and the start of their “Welcome Back” program.

In case you haven’t been paying attention, the Welcome Back program for users of Sony’s Play Station Network is an effort to appease upset after a major security breach that put personal information (including passwords and credit card info) in the hands of hackers.

For the most part I have stayed away from discussion about this controversial breach of trust and how I felt as a customer. Suffice to say Sony felt the need to extend an apology to consumers and the Welcome Back program is an extension of that apology.

The email sounded a little something like this:

Dear MyaSharona,

Thanks for your patience and continued support during our service outage. To show you how
much we value that, we want to let you know about our “Welcome Back” appreciation program:

If you took advantage of the PS+ service, PSP downloads, or PS Home items, I’d love to hear from you as well.

Don’t forget that with the Welcome Back program:

• You can download the available content on up to five activated systems that are associated with the PlayStation Network account.
• Existing PlayStation Plus subscribers will receive an additional 60 days of free subscription.