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Valve detail their plans to combat Steam Deck OLED scalpers (www.gamingonlinux.com)

submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (2 children)

There's a reliable way to combat scalping in general. Start selling the item at a high price or in larger quantity and then cut the price whenever sales drop off.

Scalpers can only make money by scalping something when it is being sold below what the market is willing to pay for it in the quantity in which it is available.

On a non-economic note, I'd add that I don't think I'd want to buy an easily-modified Linux computer system from some random person unless I planned to wipe it. How do you know that the thing hasn't been rootkitted?

[–] [email protected] 16 points 11 months ago (2 children)

There’s a reliable way to combat scalping in general. Start selling the item at a high price or in larger quantity and then cut the price whenever sales drop off.

That alone might be effective at reducing scalping, but would also put the item beyond the reach of entire income classes.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

At first, sure, but the price drops off as existing demand is met.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

The higher price isn't permanent.

I've worked in camera retail and the local shops do just that, actually, and it's effective. The FOMO people get their stuff first at a higher price, the shop gets a boost in margins, and everyone else gets to enjoy cheaper prices three months later (and have the early adopters sit through the bugs and first-run issues).

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago

Can’t really do that with such a hot product. Would cause too much PR damage and outrage. Companies don’t do it because this way they basically outsource the PR problem to the scalpers while allowing them to play innocent.

The level of outrage over supply issues for a video game console is disproportionate a lot of the time. Outrage that would be better directed elsewhere, but I digress.