Scalpers say the press treats them unfairly; they are a 'valuable industry'

[UdyrL]

Most scalpers are more an annoyance than an issue. In this case, these guys are hoarding a product that's not critical for daily living and are taking advantage of the perfect storm the pandemic has created for them.

You don't need a new PS5 or a new XBOX. You just want the new shiny thing to play with, brag about and be cool with your friends.

You don't need a new PC (or parts), as long as your current one runs well enough for basic computing, work or school.

Anything else is solved by just waiting and holding to what you already got until a retailer (or scalper) sells at a price point you're willing to pay.

 

[Austinturner]

Nah I work a day job but plenty of times I'll see good deals or see i5/i7 dells on the curb, pick them up, add an ssd, psu, and video card and flip it. It's called a side hustle

I was just taking the piss out of the people who don’t like scalpers getting “rich” by describing a normal life, I think its a good thing you are doing mate.

 

[cliffordcooley]

Let the free market work.

The potential for scalping was not intended to be included in the definition for free market. Lets be real here. Scalping is a monopolistic plague. That is built by economic leaches and only target specific products.

 

[Knot Schure]

Every criminal seeks self-justification. Scalping needs to be made illegal.

I'm confident no criminal laws are being broken, but yes, certainly not 'ethical'.

 

[Lounds]

It isn’t illegal in most places or only for basic essentials of life.

Reselling at the highest market clearing price (particularly using auctions) is an efficient way to maximise profit in the supply chain and allocate stock to those who value it the most (will pay the most). This is similar to a real estate auction, where a house sells to the person with the capacity and willingness pay the highest price.

Most people complaining about this practice believe everyone should queue and get things in that order despite someone else being willing to pay a higher price. That is how school kids are taught to behave, not how the real world works.

The difference is that PC gaming was always accessible to people of all wages now, the mid range has become the top end prices of 8 years ago, yet most western countries around the world have had stagnant wages in many sectors. You can blow your own whistle all you want but scalpers are scum and making ordinary working folks priced out of a recreational activity most people should be able to access because of pure greed for profit. Your analogy of the housing market doesn't work because eventually a graphics card becomes worthless as better products come out, while homes become more valuable over time due to over population and demand to live in certain areas.

 

[Austinturner]

The difference is that PC gaming was always accessible to people of all wages now, the mid range has become the top end prices of 8 years ago, yet most western countries around the world have had stagnant wages in many sectors. You can blow your own whistle all you want but scalpers are scum and making ordinary working folks priced out of a recreational activity most people should be able to access because of pure greed for profit. Your analogy of the housing market doesn't work because eventually a graphics card becomes worthless as better products come out, while homes become more valuable over time due to over population and demand to live in certain areas.

Or...the top end got extended to a higher performance level by companies because people are willing to pay more, the mid range performance is where the range would stop today if higher budget consumers didn’t exist.

I don’t buy and resell pc hardware, but I’m defending those that do because buying and in demand product at below market price and selling at current market price is a perfectly legitimate way to make money.

That is correct, they are depreceating assets which is why the people arguing they are “hoarding” makes no sense, the reseller is incentivised to clear any inventory within weeks/months before it loses value. The secondary market only exists because retailers and manufacturers under priced some items, the secondary market is allocating the products to those who will pay the most, if you don’t want to pay, you have to wait for price depreceation to occur or purchase an older or lower model which are available.

 

[Karl Hungus]

Retailers can do more to stop it. Memory Express in Canada forces you to go to the store to buy and does not allow online purchases. You can reserve in store and over the phone, 1 card per address (you have to register). Problem solved, very fair (to those who have access to a store). I got an EVGA XC3 Ultra 3070 and a 5600x this way. I wouldn't even waste my time with Newegg or Amazon. Bottom line though is that these are not essential items like food and water, so stop paying scalper prices and wait for the chaos to subside, which it eventually will when the price of Ethereum craters again.

 

[Fox God Records]

Okay. Here's the deal. Y'all are conflating speculating, collecting, and scalping. They are not the same thing. Not even close.

Speculating involves the acquisition of an item that you think is going to increase in value in the future. You buy it now and sell it later at a (hopefully) obscene profit. Your deal paid off. Good for you!

Collecting is buying something you like and want to keep and enjoy. Then you watch as its value climbs over time, and if the value outweighs the sentimentality, you cash in. Good for you!

Scalping is buying every piece of available, hot commodity, high-demand, limited inventory merchandise and then turning around and immediately reselling it for multiple factors of its original cost. In the process, the available quantities at retail prices are artificially depleted and the costs are correspondingly artificially increased. It is market manipulation at the secondary market level.

Scalping is not wine collecting. Profit from wine collecting takes years of patience. As does any type of collecting, really. The same goes for speculating. If you buy the right piece of land or the right building or the right car or the right stock, you might make a decent profit -- a few years later.

Scalping is the "pump & dump" of the retail market. Pump up the hype and then dump your robobought inventory on the market at 25x retail price. But only to the morons that have to have the bleeding edge stuff a month before anyone else.

The smart money waits until the hype has died down and then buys the regular, not-painted-yellow, version of the exact same thing at a retail discount.

They say, "Don't hate the playa, hate the game." Okay, I hate the game. From shoes to GPUs to consoles to watches, if it's a limited edition, limited quantity, limited time only, special edition, whatever... The retailers need to beef up the sales verification. But I also hate the playas. The scalpers AND the *****s that feed them.

 

[Tuzzy]

....as long a They understand a Life can ALSO be treated as a Commodity , then We are on the same Page.....after all it is about Profit....right ?

 

[Lounds]

Okay. Here's the deal. Y'all are conflating speculating, collecting, and scalping. They are not the same thing. Not even close.

Speculating involves the acquisition of an item that you think is going to increase in value in the future. You buy it now and sell it later at a (hopefully) obscene profit. Your deal paid off. Good for you!

Collecting is buying something you like and want to keep and enjoy. Then you watch as its value climbs over time, and if the value outweighs the sentimentality, you cash in. Good for you!

Scalping is buying every piece of available, hot commodity, high-demand, limited inventory merchandise and then turning around and immediately reselling it for multiple factors of its original cost. In the process, the available quantities at retail prices are artificially depleted and the costs are correspondingly artificially increased. It is market manipulation at the secondary market level.

Scalping is not wine collecting. Profit from wine collecting takes years of patience. As does any type of collecting, really. The same goes for speculating. If you buy the right piece of land or the right building or the right car or the right stock, you might make a decent profit -- a few years later.

Scalping is the "pump & dump" of the retail market. Pump up the hype and then dump your robobought inventory on the market at 25x retail price. But only to the morons that have to have the bleeding edge stuff a month before anyone else.

The smart money waits until the hype has died down and then buys the regular, not-painted-yellow, version of the exact same thing at a retail discount.

They say, "Don't hate the playa, hate the game." Okay, I hate the game. From shoes to GPUs to consoles to watches, if it's a limited edition, limited quantity, limited time only, special edition, whatever... The retailers need to beef up the sales verification. But I also hate the playas. The scalpers AND the *****s that feed them.

They're in the same market as people who mass organise the buy out of music artists tours, so they can resell a large portion of the tickets available at double the price...

 

[mrmason62]

There's a very quick and effective way to put the scalpers out of business.
Don't buy from them.
Its that simple.
And then it's goodbye to these people.
Unfortunately we live in a strange world where people feel that their lives will fall apart if they don't have the latest toys to brag about and show off to others.
It's time people learned some self control and common sense and stopped buying from scalpers.

 

[dnous]

Scalpers have no value, they add no value to the product they sell. In case of the PS5, they actively cheat the system in order to buy the product that you want in order to sell it to you for a higher price. How can one even think that a practice like this is valuable?

 

[cliffordcooley]

How can one even think that a practice like this is valuable?

I suppose the same way people think Wall Street is valuable.

 

[Gezzer]

I don't necessarily have an issue with scalping per se. After all I have scalped (resold for more than I paid) concert tickets that I did not need before. The thing is, I got in line and waited for those tickets. I didn't cut in front of everybody and buy every ticket the booth had. It's different for ticket sales kind of, but I think you get my point.

Do I have a problem with a guy going out and buying two hard-to-get items in order to sell one so he can essentially keep one for free? No. Do I have a problem with a guy who goes out, butts in front of me, and buys every last item in the store, and then offers me the privilege buying one from him at twice the price as if he is doing me a favor or providing me a "valuable" service? Yes.

I totally agree. And IMHO the problem is really easy to fix. Prioritize B&M retailers over e-retailers when allocating stock. It's much easier to enforce a "one per customer" policy when it's actual real people making the exchange. Unfair to e-retailers? Sure, but then they have a incentive to fix the problem. As it stands now e-retailers can pay all the lip service they want to fixing the volume scalper problem while doing nothing. They're making sales regardless of who is buying and they know it. Will this ever happen? Don't hold your breath, Sony and MS want the shortage hype just as much as the e-retailers and volume scalpers do. They all make money due to it...

 

[Knot Schure]

There are already middlemen, they're called the retailers. Scalpers are leeching off of society by artificially affecting supply and calling themselves the middlemen.

Not all manufacturers are able (or willing) to deal with the public, thus retailers can offer product advice, returns, and local stock.

Scalpers, as you well know, are somewhat unethical, offer nothing to you and I, nor the common good. Like a day trader, a true leech on society.

 

[Sir Sparkles]

It's been illegal to scalp concert tickets in Australia for years... the only people who have benefited from that are the fans who want to see their favourite artists without paying exorbitant prices.
No reason at all this can't be done with tech goods as well. It's simply unscrupulous profiteering, there is no additional service or value provided.
I say bring the laws and shut em all down.

 

[DonquixoteIII]

Unethical, immoral, greedy scumbag bottom dwellers feeding off of the impatience of the entitled trust babies.

 

[Cal Jeffrey]

I totally agree. And IMHO the problem is really easy to fix. Prioritize B&M retailers over e-retailers when allocating stock. It's much easier to enforce a "one per customer" policy when it's actual real people making the exchange. Unfair to e-retailers? Sure, but then they have a incentive to fix the problem. As it stands now e-retailers can pay all the lip service they want to fixing the volume scalper problem while doing nothing. They're making sales regardless of who is buying and they know it. Will this ever happen? Don't hold your breath, Sony and MS want the shortage hype just as much as the e-retailers and volume scalpers do. They all make money due to it...

True, but the problem is that B&M retailers have shifted all sales to their websites because: COVID. According to them they want to avoid the mad rush and crowds associated with console releases. My problem with the excuse is we are now fully three months past launch. Not only that, at the height of the pandemic, I waited in long queues outside the grocery store just to get my food. Are they trying to tell me they are unable to enforce the same queuing rules for selling video game consoles? Puh-leeze.