Scalper-Bots Shake Down Desperate PS5, Xbox Series X Shoppers:
Retail bots are helping scalpers scoop up PS5, Xbox Series X inventory and charge massive markups.
It's a big week for gamers across the globe, with imminent, dueling releases of Xbox Series X and PlayStation PS5. However, an army of retail bots threaten to drive prices up as much as three times the retail price, putting the coveted holiday gifts well out of reach of everyday fans.
Retailers were quickly cleared out of Xbox inventory on its release day Tuesday. Best Buy sold theirs out quickly, priced at $499.99. There were plenty available on eBay though, with price tags more than double that price, several marked at over $1,000.
The PlayStation 5, also priced at $499.99, doesn't come out officially until Thursday, but there were several pre-order confirmations — not even actual product — available on eBay listed for around $900. And experts suspect scalpers will similarly be able to snatch up those consoles on release day, just like the Xbox, mark them up and turn a tasty profit off holiday shoppers.
Making these high-tech hoarders harder to stop is that what they're doing isn't actually illegal, according to Jason Kent, hacker-in-residence for Cequence Security.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday November 16 2020, @04:34PM (8 children)
Like TP, only more expensive/unit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Touché) by PaperNoodle on Monday November 16 2020, @05:10PM
At least TP correlates to a more hygienic life style.
B3
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday November 16 2020, @06:08PM (6 children)
Except: TP is harder to substitute, and more necessary on a daily basis.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @06:33PM
Assuming you are at home (like many these days), then:
TP not necessary at all, if you have a sink that you are willing to double as a bidet (back up to the sink). Or just step off the toilet in to the shower and wash your ass.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday November 16 2020, @06:58PM (4 children)
Yeah, ever since the tablet/phone replaced the newspaper...
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday November 16 2020, @07:13PM (3 children)
It has been a while since we got a Sears catalog the old Tennessee outhouse accessory, after corn cobs.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @07:23PM (2 children)
Pine Cones.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday November 16 2020, @09:34PM (1 child)
Stinging nettle leaves?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 17 2020, @03:36AM
I just knew that huge pile of AOL disks I've been saving would be useful one day!
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @04:58PM (5 children)
if we just didn't live in such a communist society, the invisible hand of capitalism would solve such a problem. right??
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @05:35PM (4 children)
It did. You just don't like the result.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Monday November 16 2020, @11:13PM (3 children)
That would be because instead of stopping the problem, it caused it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 17 2020, @03:42AM (2 children)
What, precisely, is the problem?
Somebody couldn't buy a console because someone else bought it first? So fucking what? Wait a few weeks and they'll be able to get one then. If you think it's terrible that they have to wait, well they'd have had to wait if the manufacturers decided to release it at a later date -- would that be a tragedy? Is it horrible that the consoles weren't released three months ago?
What, precisely, is the fucking problem? Is it that there really are people out there so desperate for a console, and possessing of enough extra money, that they'll pay extra to get one immediately... and that there are people out there willing to take that money from them? Who in any of this has a gun pointed at their head?
Or is the problem that you don't like what some people choose to do in a free society, even when it doesn't impact you in any way, shape, or form? Is that what the problem is?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 17 2020, @09:22PM
It's not Pareto efficient. It's predatory. All parties involved are negatively effected, with the sole exception being the scalper. The scalper actually only risks possible theft in transit, which is a negligible risk in and of itself. Even if there was a snap supply boom, they paid retail + S&H, which means they can anchor to MSRP and take no or very little loss. Retailers who adopt their pricing would be frowned upon, and that's assuming they're even allowed to adjust pricing in the first place (I suspect there are partnership deals that enforce MSRP, leveraging preferred supply). It also increases stress on their business, they want smooth launches and distribution to a wide network of people. Their profits are somewhat contingent on supplying individuals as well, since most components aren't purchased individually. Handling launches incompetently would also make them look bad. The Manufacturers are likewise negatively effected, though in a more abstract sense. In one hand their failure to forecast demand and produce adequate supply doesn't paint a flattering picture, you can see this in all the hue and cry that has precipitated from such recent failures in every corner of the internet. They're also missing out on critical in-the-wild testing, and on reviews, which means future sells might be compromised since large numbers of their components are being held simply to manipulate pricing. Not to say I think it should be regulated, but this isn't a picture of free market success. Personally I foresee litigation being pursued against eBay and the likes, since they have perverse incentives and are allowing damaging conduct to precipitate, and Ticketmaster is being handled in much the same way.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Tuesday November 17 2020, @10:17PM
The problem is that economic efficiency is greatly reduced by allowing a completely non-productive entity to make huge profits. They create an artificial scarcity and then rake in profit off of that scarcity. Effectively, they are economic parasites.
That puts them right up there with the crooked gas station attendants that puncture your tire and then offer you a special price to patch it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @05:05PM (3 children)
I've never been one that needed to have the latest, new shiny thing. But I've certainly seen this in action, advertisers are happy to play on people's emotions (insecurity?) and love to drive early adopters to purchase at nearly any cost.
Every now and then I see something that really attracts me...and on rare occasions I've succumbed to that impulse buy, so I know I'm not completely immune to ads.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @05:38PM
In this case, it's a matter of wanting to have it by Christmas or on launch that encourages it. It's not like when Nintendo released those miniconsoles where they never produced enough of them to fill demand where people effectively had to buy from scalpers or on the 2nd hand market in order to get one.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Monday November 16 2020, @10:11PM (1 child)
I've actually been on the other end of this. Dream Theater, in a venue that had been open about 2 weeks (Magnolia in El Cajon, Ca), about 2 miles from my house. I wanted to go but couldn't afford the $100+ tickets, the venue was sold out. Morning of the concert checked, and I got a pretty decent ticket for $30, plus $15 in fees. Considering the base seat (pre scalper) was $75 I was good with that. I figure the scalper lost money, I got a pretty good seat, and got to see a band I love at a discount that the band I love didn't have to eat.
On the other hand, I paid $15 in fees for a $30 ticket. Which is why this is the first concert I've been to in 20 years, the accumulated fees are tending higher than the ticket price itself. So fuck TicketShafter, which is something I've been saying since I was a teenager in the 70's buying Black Sabbath concert tickets the second the TicketShafter window opened, only to find best I could do was 10th row seats.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @10:26PM
Ah, the good old pre-internet days. I remember waiting outside the mall on an early morning waiting for the door to open so that they would escort us in to purchase concert tickets. The Ticketron office was in the back of one of the big department stores (I think it was Hecht's, but there was a Sears, Penny's, and Montgomery Ward there too).
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday November 16 2020, @05:15PM
They should sell them for $999.95
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by EvilSS on Monday November 16 2020, @05:37PM (3 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @06:13PM
There is at least one other "only way" you didn't mention, which is, imo practical, if the manufacturer cared enough to do it.
The manufacturers could handle distribution directly over the web, with a lottery to determine the shipping sequence (apply typical controls to try to limit how many requests can come from one person/address). Keep the product out of the wholesale/retail chain for the first month or so. This could be much more practical than in years past, since Amazon, or Walmart-online (and possibly others) are capable of handling the fulfillment under contract, so the manufacturer can "rent" all the services needed.
It may still fall apart, once a truckload of the new product is stolen...but I think it has a reasonable chance of success.
Some popular tickets (that were being scalped up to huge prices) have been sold this way. For example some of the last Grateful Dead concerts had tickets distributed by lottery to circumvent most of the scalping.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @06:28PM
There is no incentive to stop it. MS and Sony are selling their stock at the prices they wanted and the scarcity scalping drive the hype to keep the demand high. If the situation reflected poorly on MS and Sony, they would figure a different way to do it, but as it is, it reflects poorly on the bots and the scalpers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @08:27PM
How about a verified address with ID. Show ID at delivery. One per.. ("over-regulation" and "privacy" screams - yeah, by this point what privacy?)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 16 2020, @06:35PM (5 children)
What's the problem? Scarce luxury good in demand drives up secondary market price is called capitalism. It's not a basic resource like water, air, food, shelter, arguably communication.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Tuesday November 17 2020, @12:35AM (4 children)
The problem looking to be solved is:
"How do you efficiently distribute a scarce product to enthusiastic fans equitably without regard to their wealth beyond their having the means to pay the MSRP"
Capitalism works against a solution to this problem, because capitalism is trying to efficiently distribute the resource based on willingness to pay; incorrectly equating willingness to pay with greatest need or greatest appreciation for the product; and ultimately it just solves the problem of efficiently getting the product to the rich kids. But that, friend, is not the distribution we were looking for, and capitalism is actively working against us.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 18 2020, @03:02AM (3 children)
The whole problem is this idea of a MSRP. There shouldn't be one. In a free market the manufacturer gets to set their selling price, not the retail price. Scalpers are just low volume, high mark-up retailers. If you don't want to buy from them you don't have to.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Wednesday November 18 2020, @06:04AM (2 children)
"In a free market the manufacturer gets to set their selling price, not the retail price."
Strange that your idea of a free market is to immediately limit freedom :)
"Scalpers are just low volume, high mark-up retailers."
The function of a "retailer" is to get product from manufacturers to consumers; handling local storage, single unit sales, and customer service concerns. Who needs another layer of "retailer" who just stands in front me at a full service retail shop, buys the thing I wanted, and then turns around and offers to sell it to me for more money than they paid for it while providing no additional value or service.
"If you don't want to buy from them you don't have to."
Correct. But since they were front of me at the actual retailer and bought out all the stock, it means I'm not buying it at all anytime soon. Which is kind of the whole market failure we're discussing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 20 2020, @12:53PM (1 child)
"Strange that your idea of a free market is to immediately limit freedom :)"
socially-left-wing anarcho-capitalist actually.
Your right to swing a fist ends at someone else's face. Your right to set the price ends after you sell it.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Monday November 30 2020, @02:59AM
"Your right to set the price ends after you sell it."
Agreed. But you don't have any right to force me, as a manufacturer, to sell you anything either. So if we can't come to some sort of agreement about what the terms of our relationship is, like say, a 'contract', then I'm not selling you anything. I'll find someone else to distribute my goods, and you can pound sand. That's the free market at work.
(Score: 2) by Opportunist on Monday November 16 2020, @10:13PM
That's what made America great...
(Score: 2) by legont on Tuesday November 17 2020, @02:17AM
I've never ever in my life spent my time waiting to buy shit. Can't you do something more productive or enjoyable?
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 2) by progo on Tuesday November 17 2020, @02:47AM
With Christmas Dinner cancelled and Christmas spread out over a quarter, how many people REALLY care about getting these things right away?