Sony launched the "Yarouze" project back in 1995 to encourage development for the first Playstation. "Dokodemo Issho" and "XI[sai]" were two million-seller titles to come out of the project. Until the project closed in 1999, the company received a total of 1200 applications.
The project is back. Sony is re-establishing the project to encourage development on the Playstation 2, PSP, and Playstation 3. The press release is a bit lacking on specific details, but it does specify that Sony will "back up" developers, financially and technically, to get them established.
We can't say this means Sony is supporting homebrew, but we can at least say Sony wants to encourage people to get involved in programming for their devices. The official Japanese press release is below: