I was told today by my brother-in-law that Sony went back to the drawing board with the PS3 when they saw the Xbox 360, and would probably not be ready by Spring. He's pretty pro-Xbox though.
Sony got fat and rich off PS2 so that's why they were slacking off for the whole time. The same thing happened with Nintendo a couple years ago.
Unlikely.
For one, Sony's said they're still on track for a Spring release date. The thing is, they've never said if Spring 2006 applied to the US or not. Most likely, it's a Japan-only release date, as Spring is when the PSX and PS2 launched in Japan.
Your brother in law is letting his bias show.