Bill Being Pushed to Outlaw Bots From Snatching Up Online Goods

I agree that extreme measures would definitely stop things. I think just making it illegal would stop many from doing it. There's no risk involved right now ... no consequences like you said. The only consequence is pissing people off. And it does seem to be getting worse.
Speeding is illegal but the overwhelming majority of the population do it anyway. The consequence is just a fine, so no one really cares. So for something far less dangerous such as scalping, at best you worked be looking at a minimal fine. Would simply become the cost of doing business, as they say with large companies and their fines. So yeah, I once again think this proposal is stupid because it won't accomplish anything. Thanks for the civil discussion though, I'll check in tomorrow.
 
how many decades ago was it that they were going to end spam calls?
It was a while ago that they were calling for telecoms to block the services, and they said sure but we are going to have to do X,Y,Z things to do this and we are going to charge for it, so then the government said NO you're gonna have to do that for free, and then they just went LOL NO. Fast forward some 20 years and here we are with the first actual steps being taken to do this in or around 2018. And this was spurred on by not the government nor the phone companies but the Credit Card companies who are tired of writing off losses as users get scammed then refute the charges.
 
Preface: I don't have a bot. I don't enter the NE shuffle every day (and when I do, I only have 1 account and I don't overpay for non-sense combos). I have a full time job that doesn't involve sitting in front of a computer. I don't do discord groups. I don't have a MC nearby. I've never paid scalped prices other than the AIB markup.

I've had 2x3090s, 2x3080Tis, 3x3080s, 2x3070Tis, 3x3070s, 2x3060Tis, 1x3060, 1x6900xt, 1x6800xt, 1x6800, a PS5, and an OLED Switch. I don't have all those cards anymore. I stepped some of them up at EVGA. I traded some for others at MSRP swaps, and all my friends and family have upgrades.

If you haven't gotten a card by this point, quite frankly, you aren't trying hard enough, are holding out for the mythical "MSRP Founders Edition" card pricing, or are just looking in the wrong places. The level of whining in this thread is epic...
 
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Preface: I don't have a bot. I don't enter the NE shuffle every day (and when I do, I only have 1 account and I don't overpay for non-sense combos). I have a full time job that doesn't involve sitting in front of a computer. I don't do discord groups. I don't have a MC nearby. I've never paid scalped prices other than the AIB markup.

I've had 2x3090s, 2x3080Tis, 3x3080s, 2x3070Tis, 3x3070s, 2x3060Tis, 1x3060, 1x6900xt, 1x6800xt, 1x6800, a PS5, and an OLED Switch. I don't have all those cards anymore. I stepped some of them up at EVGA. I traded some for others at MSRP swaps, and all my friends and family have upgrades.

If you haven't gotten a card by this point, quite frankly, you aren't trying hard enough, are holding out for the mythical "MSRP Founders Edition" card pricing, or are just looking in the wrong places. The level of whining in this thread is epic...
Your comment is actually more annoying to me than scalpers. Nobody cares how many you got. “You aren’t trying hard enough” is incomprehensibly obnoxious.
 
Weird how people want less regulation until something annoys them then they want it made illegal.
Capitalism vs communism. Maybe somewhere in between there's a balance that the far left and the far right don't want people to know about...

(Don't @ me about this, I'm not American. The only horse I have in this particular race is that almost all global pricing for tech follows America's lead.)
 
Good. Well, execution is going to be problematic but at the very least it takes away the excuse "it is not illegal therefore it is OK" and I am good with that.
 
Good. Well, execution is going to be problematic but at the very least it takes away the excuse "it is not illegal therefore it is OK" and I am good with that.
Some of you seem more passionate about killing scalpers than say … human traffickers.
 
Nobody wants a handout. Your attitude is disgusting.

Sure you do. Half the people in this thread want to be able to walk into Best Buy and have a choice of 30 different cards at or below MSRP including Founders cards and want the government to intervene when they can't do that. In an ideal world, sure, sounds great. The economic reality is that the Best Buy fantasy isn't happening for various reasons. This isn't food and water (and toilet paper). We are talking about luxury items. People either need to learn to live without it, put more effort into obtaining said items, or just pay the price if they choose not to put forth the effort. Nobody is entitled to a luxury item. That's the new economic reality. The fact that this proposed law references the "Grinch" shows how foolish it really is.
 
Sure you do. Half the people in this thread want to be able to walk into Best Buy and have a choice of 30 different cards at or below MSRP including Founders cards and want the government to intervene when they can't do that. In an ideal world, sure, sounds great. The economic reality is that the Best Buy fantasy isn't happening for various reasons. This isn't food and water (and toilet paper). We are talking about luxury items. People either need to learn to live without it, put more effort into obtaining said items, or just pay the price if they choose not to put forth the effort. Nobody is entitled to a luxury item. That's the new economic reality. The fact that this proposed law references the "Grinch" shows how foolish it really is.
Again, you’re wrong. And your attitude is disgusting.
 
Preface: I don't have a bot. I don't enter the NE shuffle every day (and when I do, I only have 1 account and I don't overpay for non-sense combos). I have a full time job that doesn't involve sitting in front of a computer. I don't do discord groups. I don't have a MC nearby. I've never paid scalped prices other than the AIB markup.

I've had 2x3090s, 2x3080Tis, 3x3080s, 2x3070Tis, 3x3070s, 2x3060Tis, 1x3060, 1x6900xt, 1x6800xt, 1x6800, a PS5, and an OLED Switch. I don't have all those cards anymore. I stepped some of them up at EVGA. I traded some for others at MSRP swaps, and all my friends and family have upgrades.

If you haven't gotten a card by this point, quite frankly, you aren't trying hard enough, are holding out for the mythical "MSRP Founders Edition" card pricing, or are just looking in the wrong places. The level of whining in this thread is epic...
😂 That's hilarious.
 
Preface: I don't have a bot. I don't enter the NE shuffle every day (and when I do, I only have 1 account and I don't overpay for non-sense combos). I have a full time job that doesn't involve sitting in front of a computer. I don't do discord groups. I don't have a MC nearby. I've never paid scalped prices other than the AIB markup.

I've had 2x3090s, 2x3080Tis, 3x3080s, 2x3070Tis, 3x3070s, 2x3060Tis, 1x3060, 1x6900xt, 1x6800xt, 1x6800, a PS5, and an OLED Switch. I don't have all those cards anymore. I stepped some of them up at EVGA. I traded some for others at MSRP swaps, and all my friends and family have upgrades.

If you haven't gotten a card by this point, quite frankly, you aren't trying hard enough, are holding out for the mythical "MSRP Founders Edition" card pricing, or are just looking in the wrong places. The level of whining in this thread is epic...
So uhh, how'd you get them?
 
If anything what is more concerning is what the market bears over MSRP.
In other words, expect future MSRPs to be stratospheric. $2500 for 4090? $3k?
Ridiculous that a flagship costs more the PC it goes in. And when in short supply they fetch considerably more than that?
No wonder there is a (personal) unsecured debt problem.
 
In other words, expect future MSRPs to be stratospheric.
I was expecting that anyway. Going rate for a card these days seems to be directly related to daily returns when mining. 1 year of mining returns = cost of card. So if the 4090 makes about $10/day, I fully expect it to be a bit over $3500.
 
Forget LHR, make it so the (mining client) immediately crashes (HAL BSOD / kernal panic) when trying to mine on new GPUs. ;-)
 
I believe most cellular phones these days can require the flag to be set in order for the phone to ring
FWIW, I use a Galaxy S20 FE, and apparently it comes with the Samsung phone app, not the Google one, by default. In the settings, there's a disabled-but-on "protect me from spam calls" setting. Since it's disabled, I can't tap it to see if it has any additional options behind it. Next time I get a spam call I'll see what hitting the reject button does--drop or go to voicemail--because as I said, the latter option isn't all that useful to me--or if there's any extra options I hadn't paid attention to before.

I also just found & installed the Google phone app; I'll try that later to see how different it is. It has a lot of 1- and 2-star reviews in the last few days.
 
The only way a B&M could do it is to require a drivers license and then keep a database of who bought what... plus telling B&M "yeah you're not allowed to sell stuff online anymore" really will go over well.
Micro Center supposedly does that--must show ID to buy a video card, and a given address can only buy one per month or something.
 
If 100% of scalpers dropped dead tomorrow, nothing of value would be lost.
Scalpers actually do provide one value. They balance the demand supply curve so that if you actually wanted to buy a GPU you could (at scalper pricing). The alternative is that all of supply is out of stock and you cant buy anything even if you have the money (unless you use a bot to snipe one).
 
When scalpers snatch up all available inventory from retailers who had to sell at a reasonable price to stay afloat, the scalpers create artificial scarcity for their own profit. It really is just little more than stealing, opportunistic resale should be something shunned in a decent society.
Retailers who sell at reasonable prices? like MSRP? They are out of stock, they probably should have raised prices (also when your competition is out of stock they aren't competition anymore.) . If people are willing to buy at scalper prices from scalpers dont you think they'd rather pay the same price but from retailers?

Scalping does not create artificial scarcity. The product is still on the market, the price has been changed.
 
Scalpers actually do provide one value. They balance the demand supply curve so that if you actually wanted to buy a GPU you could (at scalper pricing). The alternative is that all of supply is out of stock and you cant buy anything even if you have the money (unless you use a bot to snipe one).
Or the alternative is that those that actually wanted their cards have already bought them, and thus are no longer in the market. You have no way to know how many cards scalpers are sitting on waiting to sell. It's really difficult to know how things would have panned out in an alternate universe. All that does is restrict these items to those willing to pay the highest possible price. The net result is still less people having cards, and most consumers are out of more money to these middle men who got paid for doing nothing.

I think it will settle down next generation though, because nvidia and amd must have learned their lessons and the entry level cards will be at 2k+ and halo cards starting at 6k. Now due to the scalpers, prices will skyrocket, to the point where scalpers can't make a profit because very few will be willing to pay the insane prices in the first place, nevermind a scalper's market on top.
 
Retailers who sell at reasonable prices? like MSRP? They are out of stock, they probably should have raised prices (also when your competition is out of stock they aren't competition anymore.) . If people are willing to buy at scalper prices from scalpers dont you think they'd rather pay the same price but from retailers?

Scalping does not create artificial scarcity. The product is still on the market, the price has been changed.
For most sane people, buying from a scalper isn't availability, because of the high risk involved. So since scalpers are not considered an avenue of purchase, it is scarcity. I don't need to rehash all the risk a buyer takes on when purchasing from a scalper vs a retail sale.
 
Or the alternative is that those that actually wanted their cards have already bought them, and thus are no longer in the market. You have no way to know how many cards scalpers are sitting on waiting to sell. It's really difficult to know how things would have panned out in an alternate universe. All that does is restrict these items to those willing to pay the highest possible price. The net result is still less people having cards, and most consumers are out of more money to these middle men who got paid for doing nothing.

I think it will settle down next generation though, because nvidia and amd must have learned their lessons and the entry level cards will be at 2k+ and halo cards starting at 6k. Now due to the scalpers, prices will skyrocket, to the point where scalpers can't make a profit because very few will be willing to pay the insane prices in the first place, nevermind a scalper's market on top.
People scalp fucking houses.

Sorry, "flip" or "property manage"
 
People scalp fucking houses.

Sorry, "flip" or "property manage"
I think that's scummy too and a major problem. Those that buy it and just relist it higher right away can also die. It's one thing to buy a beat up old home and renovate it, that's what I would consider a flip.
 
Where did you pull that red herring out from? Who was talking about human trafficking here and wtf it has to do with scalpers?
I don't know, where did the consensus come from that killing people would be a viable solution? Just seems like a bit much.
 
I don't know, where did the consensus come from that killing people would be a viable solution? Just seems like a bit much.
It was never a consensus. I, and I alone, suggested not enforcing trial of someone for the murder of a scalper. In that same post, I also said yes it's extreme, but it's one of the only ways I could see it actually having an impact. No one was clamoring to go hunt down and kill scalpers. It was to illustrate how difficult this problem is to address. Please identify all these others that have called for murder, I must have missed all their posts.
 
I'll take no part in preying upon the desperate, even if they are willing.
You could consider it helping the desperate as well as yourself. Obtain product and sell it at a small profit for you but much cheaper than what's at eBay or amazon.
 
Sure you do. Half the people in this thread want to be able to walk into Best Buy and have a choice of 30 different cards at or below MSRP including Founders cards and want the government to intervene when they can't do that.
Not me. I don't want government intervention on anything, despite what some people here on this forum think of me. All I want is to level the playing field. I have no problem spending MSRP or slightly above on a new graphics card, but I'm not paying some third party seller off Amazon or Newegg $2500+ for something that's supposed to be at $800-1200. And yes, I would like to be able to walk into a store and purchase a piece of hardware. Remember those days? Weren't they grand?
 
Not me. I don't want government intervention on anything, despite what some people here on this forum think of me. All I want is to level the playing field. I have no problem spending MSRP or slightly above on a new graphics card, but I'm not paying some third party seller off Amazon or Newegg $2500+ for something that's supposed to be at $800-1200. And yes, I would like to be able to walk into a store and purchase a piece of hardware. Remember those days? Weren't they grand?

Fair enough. I don't think too many people spring for the $2500+ variety, but I understand where you are coming from. I remember being able to buy stuff that was actually in stock, and it was great. But in light of whatever reasons for the shortfall...covid, supply issues, miners, etc. I think it's going to be a while before we get back there. I don't know that you'll ever see a bargain basement priced $699 3080 regularly in stock, and its almost guaranteed the next gen will be somewhat higher priced.

He doesn't seem like a nice person. Looks like he took a shining to you.

I think we've had our disagreements about RTX and DLSS plenty before he sold me that card. He didn't hold it against me that we had a different opinion.
 
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