Bill Being Pushed to Outlaw Bots From Snatching Up Online Goods

[kirbyrj]

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.

I mean the argument goes that if you don't need it leave it for someone who does, but on the other hand, the next potential buyer is likely someone who is going to resell it. At the very least, buying it and selling it here allows the [H] crowd to have the card.

 

[serpretetsky]

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.

I see, and what do you think of someone that wants to sell something as fast as possible, so they set a low price, and they'd rather a scalper buy it quickly rather than wait for someone else. Is this scummy?

 

[arnemetis]

I see, and what do you think of someone that wants to sell something as fast as possible, so they set a low price, and they'd rather a scalper buy it quickly rather than wait for someone else. Is this scummy?

Hmm in that case, no. Unless they specifically hunted down someone who wanted to scalp it, they couldn't know what that buyer would do. Dropping price to move product is common in many industries, and provides a benefit to both parties (money now for the seller, and a lower price for the purchaser.) If the purchaser ends up being a reselling scalper, that's on them, and they are who I have an issue with.

 

[1_rick]

I don't think too many people spring for the $2500+ variety

Judging from how long they've been sitting in stock at my local Micro Center I'm sure you're right.

 

[kirbyrj]

Judging from how long they've been sitting in stock at my local Micro Center I'm sure you're right.

There's been a $1,600 6900xt on NE and sold by NE for weeks.

 

[1_rick]

There's been a $1,600 6900xt on NE and sold by NE for weeks.

That's, ah, that's probably more reasonable than the--holy crap, someone bought the $2500 liquid-cooled ASUS 6900XT, but there's still 3 $2050 Sapphire liquid cooled ones (and that one's a better deal, too, because it's got a 3-fan rad, instead of only 2!)

 

[kaneO]

I mean the argument goes that if you don't need it leave it for someone who does, but on the other hand, the next potential buyer is likely someone who is going to resell it. At the very least, buying it and selling it here allows the [H] crowd to have the card.

True except you can't sell it here without being considered a scalper

 

[pendragon1]

True except you can't sell it here without being considered a scalper

yeah you can. you ask for exactly what you paid for it and it alone, no "well i waited in line, i want money bs" added on.

 

[p05ta1]

hahah
Another law, mandate, that will most likely not be fallowed. You would think idiot politicians would learn this by now.
They all should be working on issues that need to be fixed....
add political comments now ....

 

[kirbyrj]

yeah you can. you ask for exactly what you paid for it and it alone, no "well i waited in line, i want money bs" added on.

I don't think it's BS at all. Time is money. If you take the time to wait in line, you should be compensated. The level of compensation is the point of contention.

 

[pendragon1]

I don't think it's BS at all. Time is money. If you take the time to wait in line, you should be compensated. The level of compensation is the point of contention.

nobody asked you to do, you could have just stayed home and gamed on the one you already had. its a bullshit sob story to make a profit.

 

[kirbyrj]

nobody asked you to do, you could have just stayed home and gamed on the one you already had. its a bullshit sob story to make a profit.

I haven't personally waited in line (maybe a virtual line with the EVGA queue). I go to work every day and expect to get paid because my time and knowledge is valuable, and I would think you do as well. I guess its only a bs sob story when you're talking about computer hardware and others time and knowledge of what to buy isn't valuable? Or the other people paying people to wait in line for them? I have people do things for me all the time for money. I've paid someone to detail my car because I don't want to take the time to do it myself for example. Back when someone was offering $2500 for a 3080Ti Founders card to people walking out of the store with one...I wouldn't do that, but I can't fault people for taking the money.

I'll agree to disagree on this to not completely derail the thread.

 

[Lakados]

The government making bots illegal is laughable, but if it forces eTailers to adopt better security and policies to remove or limit a bots ability to function on their site and to then stay ontop of updating their security and their practices then I really don’t see a downside to anybody.

 

[kaneO]

yeah you can. you ask for exactly what you paid for it and it alone, no "well i waited in line, i want money bs" added on.

How is that bs? It's actually very reasonable to pay someone a respectable fee for acquiring something that's hard to get. Charging someone double the price yeah that's excessive but for example, $100 markup on a 3080 is very reasonable and I would say it's very honorable considering the fact they sell for about $2000. In fact, I think it's dishonorable to EXPect someone to sell you something for exactly what it costs when you know they had had to sacrifice some time to acquire it when you couldn't and they could make many hundreds of dollars by selling it in many other places. IJS I would love to buy a 3080FE here on the forum for $850-$900

 

[kaneO]

I don't think it's BS at all. Time is money. If you take the time to wait in line, you should be compensated. The level of compensation is the point of contention.

A respectable amount is fair.

Curious how making it illegal would work though. How would they track it and what is the penalty? They should criminalize it like coke and give bot owner and user 10-20 years lol. Or just mandate a percent of in-store inventory maybe

 

[kirbyrj]

A respectable amount is fair.

Curious how making it illegal would work though. How would they track it and what is the penalty? They should criminalize it like coke and give bot owner and user 10-20 years lol. Or just mandate a percent of in-store inventory maybe

I would guess they would attempt to crack down on the people who write the bot programs.

 

[Twisted Kidney]

Won't work for PC components, scalpers control the market right now, but banning the practice won't stop the inflation. AMD, nVidia, AIBs, and retailers are going to pursue those massive prices for as long as possible. The bubble will burst, there will be carnage among smaller companies in the chain and I'm not sure the enthusiast market will ever be the same.

Now, scalpers have seized control of a lot of other markets and are driving horrendous inflation in some pretty essential supplies around the world. Most of the countries really being crushed like this don't have the resources to fight scalping to start with. It's all good though, this is the way it's meant to be. The strong dominate the weak, the rich consume the poor. I believe these are the fundamental values goodly human folk.

 

[sfsuphysics]

Curious how making it illegal would work though. How would they track it and what is the penalty? They should criminalize it like coke and give bot owner and user 10-20 years lol. Or just mandate a percent of in-store inventory maybe

This is the "problem" though, you have people who spend their whole career being politicians (which in itself should be illegal, but I'm not going to delve into that) waving their fist at the sky declaring "This should not happen, someone make it illegal!" and then let someone else iron out the details because they have no clue how to get things working.

Fact is you could do it a number of ways, all of which hinge on the retailer though these being the two most probably ways a law would get done.

Option A : The underaged drinking analogy. Retailers are fined for selling to bots, person buying is penalized for using said bot, person who sold said bot is charged for selling "forbidden" code. This really wouldn't work because the retailer would have to basically implicate themselves, and the only way they get caught is by LEO stings where they send in their own bots to see if they can buy stuff they're not supposed to which would also require a 3rd party audit, which in itself costs money.

Option B : Credit fraud analogy. Make rules in place that online retailers need to have sufficient security to detect/prevent these bots, as such the retailer reports any "fraud" to a "higher power" if they detect bots being used or one managed to be successful and presumably the address where said goods was sent (no PO boxes) can be tracked and followed up on. This is actually viable, not the figuring out a way to prevent bots... no one is going to crack that nut fully, but if they see someone buy a video card in 0.2 seconds of them becoming available they can at the very least either A) cancel the order by having software that flags the purchase or B) again send to LEO and let them deal with it.

Remember what ever happens is not going to stop everything, it simply makes it a crime to do said thing. People are still going to commit the crimes, especially if the risk doesn't out way the reward, a fine of a $1000? No problem I have 4 - 4080tis I'm selling for 2x the price, net profit $8000. Jail time? Doubtful it would happen.

 

[Absalom]

One would think that Nvidia, one the world leaders in AI and deep learning, would gladly leverage (or lend) their own technology to Best Buy, etc. to detect these online bots.

Over the past year, I've gotten the impression that Nvidia, AMD, etc. just don't care. LHR did nothing against the battle against bots and did very little to help Nvidia's image, I think. I feel most major e-tailers have done, at best, the bare minimum to ensure customers have a fair chance at product.

Getting the gov involved, while extreme, maybe not be the worst idea. Start requiring unique identification for purchasing (drivers license id, SSN, etc.) and limit one purchase per customer per year (EVGA sort of did this), would help fight against the whole "greed" aspect while giving the customer a fair chance against obtaining product.

Unfortunately none of these anti-bot measures solve the supply issue much less the inflated OEM pricing trends. But one battle at a time...

 

[kirbyrj]

One would think that Nvidia, one the world leaders in AI and deep learning, would gladly leverage (or lend) their own technology to Best Buy, etc. to detect these online bots.

Over the past year, I've gotten the impression that Nvidia, AMD, etc. just don't care. LHR did nothing against the battle against bots and did very little to help Nvidia's image, I think. I feel most major e-tailers have done, at best, the bare minimum to ensure customers have a fair chance at product.

Getting the gov involved, while extreme, maybe not be the worst idea. Start requiring unique identification for purchasing (drivers license id, SSN, etc.) and limit one purchase per customer per year (EVGA sort of did this), would help fight against the whole "greed" aspect while giving the customer a fair chance against obtaining product.

Unfortunately none of these anti-bot measures solve the supply issue much less the inflated OEM pricing trends. But one battle at a time...

Seeing how they farmed out their own store to Best buy because they couldn't keep the bots away doesn't give me hope. The fact that they couldn't come up with the solution makes me think they're AI is overrated.

 

[sfsuphysics]

Seeing how they farmed out their own store to Best buy because they couldn't keep the bots away doesn't give me hope. The fact that they couldn't come up with the solution makes me think they're AI is overrated.

Hey it made a realistic kitchen with an abnormal amount of spatulas for the initial keynote on the cards!

 

[DooKey]

It doesn't work because there's no financial benefit in using AI to combat "shopping bots".
Nvidia is happy to see prices rise as this will "normalize" even higher MSRP for future releases.

Yeah, only Nvidia would be happy to see prices rise...

 

[TheSlySyl]

If you make it both a punishment both to the scalper and the original seller they'll find a way to make it work.

No, it will never be perfect, and it doesn't have to be.

 

[TheSlySyl]

An example from my industry:
If we sell alcohol to someone underage, they get in trouble for drinking it, but we get a gigantic fucking fine, the person selling it gets fired, they will likely lose their liquor license and the whole damn business is put on a watch list for selling it.
If we fuck up and keep selling alcohol to minors, basically twice in a year and we're out, we lose the ability to sell alcohol AT ALL, to anyone, on top of gigantic fines that are big enough that I've seen businesses fold because of them.
Considering we're an alcohol focused business, that's pretty damn good encouragement to make sure we check IDs.

If Ebay is told "If you sell botted GPUs items you will never be allowed to have any GPUs sold on your website ever again" they'll make sure it's followed enough to look legitimate.

 

[Thatguybil]

This is no different than the law makers making laws about guns without knowing anything about guns.

Exactly so…

 

[serpretetsky]

Seeing how they farmed out their own store to Best buy because they couldn't keep the bots away doesn't give me hope. The fact that they couldn't come up with the solution makes me think they're AI is overrated.

what is their motivation to deter bots? how much do they budget for deterring bots?

 

[kirbyrj]

what is their motivation to deter bots? how much do they budget for deterring bots?

Prove their AI tech works?

 

[serpretetsky]

Prove their AI tech works?

I think they have plenty of other places to showcase their ai technologies. No one is going to stop buying their solutions over this.

 

[blackmomba]

Scalpers wouldn't exist without buyers so just stop buying at "a little over MSRP" or anything like that

Just use your own brain, no need for AI

 

[sfsuphysics]

If Ebay is told "If you sell botted GPUs items you will never be allowed to have any GPUs sold on your website ever again" they'll make sure it's followed enough to look legitimate.

The difference is you need a license to sell alcohol, you dont need one to sell gpus or ps5s or xbox whatevers or switch or literally anything that is of limited quantities that are sold online.

 

[TheSlySyl]

The difference is you need a license to sell alcohol, you dont need one to sell gpus or ps5s or xbox whatevers or switch or literally anything that is of limited quantities that are sold online.

That's not really anywhere near as big of a difference as you think.

It's legal to sell live animals without a license but Facebook Marketplace absolutely forbids it to the point that even discussing it can get you and any group it's discussed in banned.

Ebay has an entire section dedicated to "restricted" items as do most online stores.
https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/prohibited-restricted-items/prohibited-restricted-items?id=4207

Will some places still sell botted, sketchy hardware? Of course. But I wouldn't buy a $1000 GPU without some sort of buyer protection.

 

[Comixbooks]

scalpers?

 

[Markus Guitarus]

Yup, I did say it was extreme, but if that was actually passed, I would say it would be a safe bet that 99% of scalpers would stop overnight, because no one wants to risk dying to make easy money. The problem right now is there is no consequence, and this goes further than just this topic but I don't want ot get into soap box territory. I disagree that it is worse, far too high of value is placed on human life universally. This is a slippery slope though that if left unchecked will continue to expand. We see it now expanding past ticket sales and sneakers into the gpu and console market, right? What else is a high value but high demand product, how about baby formula? Just because the market is speaking with their wallets doesn't mean it's a good or sustainable thing. These people are leeches on the world, and more are born each day. Why would anyone work when I could just scalp stuff to suckers? Pretty soon the entire world is scalpers, and no one can afford to eat anymore and nothing is produced anymore. This is the real problem, when everyone gives up beign productive and just wants their easy piece of free money, everyone loses.

Yeah it really is getting to be like the next drug market, in addition to that boat chase, there was that evga truck stolen a week or two back.

There are undoubtedly a great many people out there whose existence makes the world a worse place. I've never bought into the idea that every human life has innate value, never mind being priceless. It's one's actions that establishes the value of their life.

I don't doubt those who engage in a shitty activity like scalping engage in a lot of other shitty activities in their lives; there is always a pattern of behavior with these types.

 

[Nobu]

There are undoubtedly a great many people out there whose existence makes the world a worse place. I've never bought into the idea that every human life has innate value, never mind being priceless. It's one's actions that establishes the value of their life.

I don't doubt those who engage in a shitty activity like scalping engage in a lot of other shitty activities in their lives; there is always a pattern of behavior with these types.

The thing about value is, it can also be negative...

 

[sfsuphysics]

scalpers?

At work so cant watch but... porch pirates dream?

 

[Markus Guitarus]

The thing about value is, it can also be negative...

Yup, they don't even need to be serial killers. Your run of the mill lazy good-for-nothing who constantly lies and cheats can be said to have negative value. The brother-in-law who is always begging for money and won't get a job being the archetype. Their family might love and defend them, but mostly because they're obligated to.