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Idea: New products: (charity)auctions until MSRP

Currently:

- NVidia's 30-series launch (3080, 3090 and others) was bad, AMD, Xbox and PS5 also had shortages

- Scalpers are bad

- The difference between MSRP and auction price on eBay now goes to scalpers

 

I haven't seen this as a solution:

- Make 1st batch of products available for sale

- Make it an auction with MSRP as base price. Auction lasts for at least 24h

- The difference between MSRP and sale price goes to either:

- You

- Split between you and a charity

- All to a charity

 

Next batch of products will have a lower average sale price

 

Repeat until it's expected retail price, and you can meet what seems to be the remaining, steady demand

 

Thoughts?

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It's a nice idea, but  the main problems I see is that shops aren't auction houses, so it'll likely require a lot of money and time from their side, and that this will make it unfair in other ways, e.g. people who can't drop 5 grand on a GPU will miss out. Finally scalpers or their equivalent will buy them regardless and sell them for even more.

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Auction-extensions/features exist for e.g. Magento (opensource e-commerce platform), and could probably be outsourced rather easily to e.g. eBay or [hitherto unknown company that specialises in small-batch auctions] (Drop, formerly Massdrop?)

 

What's your solution for people who can't afford 5k in the beginning?

 

I thought of adding a lottery-option for a percentage of the units to the OP, but wanted to keep it focused. Lotteries are vulnurable in other ways, but, meh: perfect solution fallacy

 

My thinking with scalpers is this:

- Auction of 1st batch is open for 1 week

- Closes, units shipped out to winners

- 2nd batch: New week, new auction

 

So unless you need it within those 7 days, you're going to wait for the next auction. With shipping times included, that doesn't seem like it would be worth it for anyone but a few. And that part could be solved by having auctions e.g. every 2 days instead of every 7

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the problem i see with this is that with an auction style sale would mean an even greater inflation of prices. yeah the price would eventually stabilize at or near the msrp, but in the first couple waves of cards you could see resale prices upwards of $4000 for a 3090. scalpers are already taking advantage of people and their wallets. this might be better in the long term (although its not likely) but in the short term i think it would be devastating to the market.

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also, the whole 1 week auction idea is pretty dumb. by running an auction for gpu's every week that gives scalpers just enough time to flip the cards for profit. then they will come back to the auction and bid up the new cards even more.

 

you asked what a solution would be for people who cant drop 5k on a card? well the reality is that there ISNT A SOLUTION. i cant help the market any more than you can. the reality is that we are going to have to wait until this blows off.

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@herb(Why) do you think the prices would go even higher if the manufacturer were to hold the auction instead of the scalpers?

 

Scalpers getting enough time to sell them at a profit I've already dealt with: Adjusting the duration of the auction

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2 hours ago, Anne-Marie said:

(Why) do you think the prices would go even higher if the manufacturer were to hold the auction instead of the scalpers?

Because that's how an auction works? I don't see why an auction would make things cheaper. You sell to the highest bidder. You even suggest MSRP as a starting price. Scalpers will just drive the prices up, buy them, and then sell them back to you at even higher prices. There is no way to regulate this, because they have no right or authority to dictate what you do with the product you buy. Most they can do is set a 1 or 2 per customer limit or something like that.

 

On 1/26/2021 at 6:04 PM, Anne-Marie said:

What's your solution for people who can't afford 5k in the beginning?

None. I can't justify buying a 3080 for $1500 either. Is that a shame? Yes, I'd like one. Is there something that can be done about it? Sadly, no. There is only one solution: for the pandemic to end and the world to return to normal.

 

On 1/26/2021 at 6:04 PM, Anne-Marie said:

My thinking with scalpers is this:

- Auction of 1st batch is open for 1 week

- Closes, units shipped out to winners

- 2nd batch: New week, new auction

 

So unless you need it within those 7 days, you're going to wait for the next auction. With shipping times included, that doesn't seem like it would be worth it for anyone but a few. And that part could be solved by having auctions e.g. every 2 days instead of every 7

How would you verify if I "need" my card in the next 7 days? See if my job benefits from it? Judge my current gaming system to see if I'm worthy of an upgrade? We don't need one, especially gamers. We just want one.

 

This is already very close to what e.g. EVGA and shops in my country are doing. When you order one, you get a spot on a waiting list and everyone will get their card in order of buying whenever a shipment comes in. My local stores have even completely stopped taking orders, because the list is growing faster than stuff comes in.

 

On 1/26/2021 at 6:04 PM, Anne-Marie said:

Lotteries are vulnurable in other ways, but, meh: perfect solution fallacy

It's nice to see people coming up with ideas for "fair" distribution of GPUs, but they all fall short for me. Every solution I've seen calls for some judging party who in the end decides who "deserves" a GPU more.

 

My reasons why this is an unsolvable problem:

  1. The world and its markets are both screwed up because of the pandemic.
  2. GPU companies aren't some good-will entity to fairly distribute cards equally to everyone. They are businesses looking to make a profit.
  3. Scalpers exist in every market and always will, no matter what you come up with. Companies won't care, see point 1.
  4. Demand is insanely high and supply is low so the price goes up. That's how markets work.
  5. There are problems over the entire supply line, leading to even lower supply and stock.

We don't need a GPU. We just want a new toy and we are sad because it's expensive. The only way this is going back to normal is for the pandemic to end and for the world to go back to a normal state. As harsh as it sounds, this is all just frustration because we can't get a new toy for a price we want to pay for it.

Crystal: CPU: i7 7700K | Motherboard: Asus ROG Strix Z270F | RAM: GSkill 16 GB@3200MHz | GPU: Nvidia GTX 1080 Ti FE | Case: Corsair Crystal 570X (black) | PSU: EVGA Supernova G2 1000W | Monitor: Asus VG248QE 24"

Laptop: Dell XPS 13 9370 | CPU: i5 10510U | RAM: 16 GB

Server: CPU: i5 4690k | RAM: 16 GB | Case: Corsair Graphite 760T White | Storage: 19 TB

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@tikkerI think a few things were miscommunicated here

 

  1. The problem this suggestion tries to fix is not high prices. Nor an ideal Fairness in GPU-Distribution™
  2. This is not meant as a pandemic/GPU-only model
  3. The seller wouldn't verify whether you need the card or not in this case

And I think companies do care about scalpers

 

I don't know what sounds harsh about what you wrote. 😃

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22 hours ago, Anne-Marie said:

The problem this suggestion tries to fix is not high prices. Nor an ideal Fairness in GPU-Distribution™

then what exactly are you trying to fix? because those are really the only BIG issues

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That the difference between sale price and what the customer pays, goes to scalpers

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