Rant-n-Rave #23

Posted by rockyran on Dec. 30, 2006, 9:08 p.m.

This RnR will come in a little form of an anecdote.

Firstly, I've been very active in a forum that half helps people get a Wii and half talks about it. I looked around in eBay for kicks and I see this pitiful sight: Some just want some quick cash by selling a Wii for $450 with a "Buy it Now" (fortunately, nobody's that big an idiot to buy it). Others keep saying that Wii sports is a "bonus" from the seller and they call it a "sports pack", never showing pictures of the box where the "Comes with Wii Sports!" sign is. Others count it as separate games like "Wii + 5 sports games!!" One I saw with "Wii with 6 games! 5 Sports and Zelda!" Some claim that the "sports pack" is rare. One fool even put an American flag background for the SD card, as if to incite some patriotic persuasion to bid on their product. Others just say that the Wii comes with 5 games. So I make a topic about it and some scalper comes in and TRIES to justify his crap by saying it's "capitalism". Truth is, scalpers HURT people's chances of getting one at the even price. If they got ONE and sold that, fine with me. It'd be as if they just got one and did with it whatever they wanted, right? But they get several. Normal consumers obviously don't need more than one system, so when someone gets more than one, they're actually taking them from other people, given that they wouldn't even be there had it not been for the fact that they're reselling them for profit.

So in one post this "dude" says:

Quote:
I think maybe in the future you just need to learn how to be prepared instead of just acting all lazy about it and not knowing what you're doing ;)

It was pretty much impossible not to get a Wii if you weren't lazy.

And thus, Rant-n-Rave #23 was born:

Quote:
Don't try to act as if you know my situation is. The fact is, you don't. I live in a College town where 99% of all Wii buyers are eBayers that I've seen in the majority of lines I've been through (college students and eBay profit. Put two and two together and you got one massive scalper coming through).

Even the entire Target store seemed to be overrun with these scalpers, given that when they got their shipment in on Wednesday, all of them were miraculously reserved for people, despite the fact that they couldn't do that and they wouldn't even tell me how to receive the same treatment, given they would make up a different story every time I asked someone else. The manager even told me to "check every morning" (what I've been doing for the past month) despite the clear fact that the shipment had arrived in the middle of the day. Everyone who I saw walk out with one was either a Target employee (except they removed their tags to "disguise" themselves despite the fact that they still had their usual employee attire on), or a scalper I had already seen in a past Sunday-shipment line.

The fact is, in MY situation, you can't get a Wii. Just impossible. And it's all due to the college scalpers I'm surrounded with. I've done calls every day, every time. I waited over 20 hours in different lines. I've argued to the Target manager about unfair reservations while seeing the Wiis being bought right in front of me. I tried the Amazon selling of Wiis yesterday all morning, running a page reloader while watching the screen for two hours, only to fail because when I clicked on the "add to cart" or "1-click checkout" button, all it did was refresh the page. I tried calling other, larger cities to see if I could get one there.

In short, I've practically done everything I can do, and every single time something has come up to impede my way, the majority of the time blocked by scalpers. And yet I see scalpers who have over 10 Wiis sitting at their houses, seeing if you can pay THEM money for something that they just stole out of YOU (some of these Wiis on eBay were from my town, information courtesy of Wiiseeker). So don't tell me I'm lazy and I haven't tried. The fact is, the reason I (and many other gamers) don't get one is due to the scalpers wanting to make a fess buck, and that's the only reason. Be prepared? I've been well over "prepared" several times. Not act lazy? I've done everything you can humanly do. Know what you're doing? By god I know very well what the Hell I'm doing. And it's still impossible for me and many other people due to this "capitalism" of yours (it's not really capitalism. It's people ripping off others and disguising it as "capitalism"). So please, don't act as if you know I was lazy and I'm complaining out of nowhere. Believe me, I've tried. I've probably tried twice as hard as you have and I have yet to get one. ONE. And you can thank THAT to scalpers.

Hissy-fit? Don't think so. I've been bottling this up for ages, and by god if I'm going to have rotten luck and circumstances, somebody's going to hear me vent my anger. And I thought, "gee, the RnR series was JUST made for that!"

Comments

Kaz 17 years, 11 months ago

Quote:
Truth is, scalpers HURT people's chances of getting one at the even price.
True, but if you can't get a Wii at the normal price then the scalpers are doing something good. We learned that in economics [:)]

Josea 17 years, 11 months ago

At least someday you'll be able to buy a Wii for $250, the minimum price here, for default, is $400, I can't get a Wii from less than that, unless I personally got to the USA.

Josea 17 years, 11 months ago

And BTW, meh, it it just a console!

By the half of next year you'll be able to go whenever you want and say "I wanna buy a wii now", and get it.

rockyran 17 years, 11 months ago

Quote:
Inform Target Headquarters. That kind of behaviour probably violates regs, so the manager and participating staff can be fired, and you might get a free wii as compensation.

That's exactly what I've been thinking. We're probably going to file in a complaint and say that if people got a reserve, we should too.

Graydon 17 years, 11 months ago

Theres plenty of extra Wii's in my city.

rockyran 17 years, 11 months ago

Quote:
Theres plenty of extra Wii's in my city.

Good. Maybe you can ship me one XD

Josea 17 years, 11 months ago

Too Bad, Graydon lives in afghanistan.