This is what a scalper looks like..

[Naff8000]

It's kinda bad for the BBC to publish the face of a child who's admitted to scalping and calls herself an entrepreneur. She isn't mature enough to realise, or maybe she now realises how bad that looks.

 

[Deleted member 66701]

The difference is that the corner shop owner is adding value by providibg a service of convenience. They are bringing it closer to you and enabling you to buy just the right number of tins rather than in bulk.

Does every method of making money have to add value or provide a service to someone in order to be recognised as valid and w worthwhile profession?

If that's the case, some bankers are in for some awkward conversations!

There are plenty of exploitative ways of making money that people are perfectly happy to accept, but as soon as it infringes on someone's ability to purchase a luxury item that they want not need, it's suddenly a problem.

 

[Deleted member 66701]

It's kinda bad for the BBC to publish the face of a child who's admitted to scalping and calls herself an entrepreneur. She isn't mature enough to realise, or maybe she now realises how bad that looks.

Yeah, I'm sure she's crying into her 50 pound note stuffed pillows at night

 

[LtMatt]

She’s probably got a neck complex now as well.

 

[pieman109]

So much hate for scalpers. Big corporations pray on the weak as well. Look at mobile phones for example. Big adverts offering the latest iPhone with 20gb data and unlimited texts etc for just £50 per month. The gullible and vulnerable are getting sucked into these deals.

I've overheard students without much money talking about how they got a "FREE" iPhone because it was GIVEN to them with their monthly minutes. Some people really believe their phone didn't cost them anything.

I'm surprised the government doesn't step in to be honest because it's very misleading to the uninformed.

Vodafone, EE, O2, Three etc are far bigger parasites than scalpers.

Big corporations make a fortune out of the gullible and stupid. This is how the world works.

I don't like scalpers either but I hate the big corporations a lot more. Scalpers are just ordinary people trying to make a living. Most of my hate is aimed at the corporations.

I honestly think that people are missing one aspect of this situation is that I'll agree that the big corpos are as bad as the scalpers, and in some cases, worse, but, you have a CHOICE with them. Example, if you think Apple are scalping, you can buy a summat from Samsung, Huawei or whoever, and you have a price range due to availability, you can buy cheap or expensive, but at least you can buy something, theres a smidgen of competition.
Secondly, and I've seen this posted a few times, that scalpers are only "trying to make a living"? How do you know that? While there are probably some on a very low wage, so use scalping to bolster their income, but where did they get the money to bulk buy graphics cards in the first place, bank of mum and dad? Most of these people use scalping on the basis of greed I reckon, nothing more, nothing less.
I think not, most are probably in jobs and they're using this practice to make extra, then using the profits to buy more and scalp even more.
The situation at the moment is there are NO graphics card for sale generally available to buy anywhere! If you want a card you go to the scalpers on the bay and pay the ludicrous mark ups for them, and all the while these parasites are laughing at you behind their keyboards for your gullibility. And, like has been mentioned, are they paying tax on the profits? no, do they pay NI, no? do they employ (in the main) others people so further contributing to the economy? no.
So there you go, thats my take on it.

 

[CuriousTomCat]

I honestly think that people are missing one aspect of this situation is that I'll agree that the big corpos are as bad as the scalpers, and in some cases, worse, but, you have a CHOICE with them. Example, if you think Apple are scalping, you can buy a summat from Samsung, Huawei or whoever, and you have a price range due to availability, you can buy cheap or expensive, but at least you can buy something, theres a smidgen of competition.
Secondly, and I've seen this posted a few times, that scalpers are only "trying to make a living"? How do you know that? While there are probably some on a very low wage, so use scalping to bolster their income, but where did they get the money to bulk buy graphics cards in the first place, bank of mum and dad? Most of these people use scalping on the basis of greed I reckon, nothing more, nothing less.
I think not, most are probably in jobs and they're using this practice to make extra, then using the profits to buy more and scalp even more.
The situation at the moment is there are NO graphics card for sale generally available to buy anywhere! If you want a card you go to the scalpers on the bay and pay the ludicrous mark ups for them, and all the while these parasites are laughing at you behind their keyboards for your gullibility. And, like has been mentioned, are they paying tax on the profits? no, do they pay NI, no? do they employ (in the main) others people so further contributing to the economy? no.
So there you go, thats my take on it.

You do realise that scalpers aren`t causing the shortage though? If scalpers didn`t exist, there would still be no stock anywhere. All stock would have been purchased by gamers and miners but that`s still not enough to go around. There would still be a worldwide shortage and most of us still wouldn`t have a good graphics card. Instead of seeing scalped 30 series graphics cards ebay, there would be none on ebay.

 

[pieman109]

You do realise that scalpers aren`t causing the shortage though? If scalpers didn`t exist, there would still be no stock anywhere. All stock would have been purchased by gamers and miners but that`s still not enough to go around. There would still be a worldwide shortage and most of us still wouldn`t have a good graphics card. Instead of seeing scalped 30 series graphics cards ebay, there would be none on ebay.

Firstly, they ARE a contributing factor to the shortage "in the shops", just look at all the graphics cards releases recently by using bots, hardly anyone could get hold of anything, all out of stock within seconds. True, they aren't the primary cause of the problem, but certainly aren't making it any better for anyone else. You'd probably find the miners are buying from scalpers at vastly inflated prices, so feeding the problem even more. The real problem with miners I reckon is they're buying direct from the manufacturers in bulk, so whats left is being scalped, leaving not even a dribble of anything worthwhile left to for the average gamer to use.

 

[Psycho Sonny]

How is this 17 yo girl scalping, has she bought or developed software?

If you read it. She's on discord and she's only buying PlayStation 5 nothing else.

She's probably bought and sold around 5 as there was no stock dropped at all from launch until February at one point. So she's only had a 1-2 month window and limited to 1 per drop if she's fast enough.

She's made at best £2k and now won't be making anything going forwards.

She's not a real scalper just hopped on the trend

 

[RayRayFPS]

I've been doing a bit of reading up and research. The software out there and tutorials is incredible.

It appear the most successfully used software is something called 'prismaio' which has been used for a while now for buying expensive trainers 'sneakers'..

I watched a youtube video of someone using it to buy a couple of ps5's (for friends) apparently and it's incredible to see how easy it is.. It throws up multiple captcha's for you to manually solve whilst using several ip's/accounts to show separate identities and even automatically puts successful catches into basket for you to finalise checkout..

No wonder you can't compete with this and no wonder scalpers can still get hold of multiple FE cards etc..

Fascinating but made me feel like I needed a shower after watching.. a dirty business indeed.

I guess if it's not technically been banned yet then I can always see people using this kind of software.

 

[Dirk Diggler]

I've been doing a bit of reading up and research. The software out there and tutorials is incredible.

It appear the most successfully used software is something called 'prismaio' which has been used for a while now for buying expensive trainers 'sneakers'..

I watched a youtube video of someone using it to buy a couple of ps5's (for friends) apparently and it's incredible to see how easy it is.. It throws up multiple captcha's for you to manually solve whilst using several ip's/accounts to show separate identities and even automatically puts successful catches into basket for you to finalise checkout..

No wonder you can't compete with this and no wonder scalpers can still get hold of multiple FE cards etc..

Fascinating but made me feel like I needed a shower after watching.. a dirty business indeed.

I guess if it's not technically been banned yet then I can always see people using this kind of software.

It would all be pointless if the mugs weren't constantly on eBay with a blank cheque at the ready. It's not entirely a victimless process, but it really is difficult to empathise with them as the process is completely dependant on their gullibility.

 

[4k4uNuNu]

Surely you'd still need multiple payment methods and physical addresses.

Unless retailers are really inept at dealing with this problem (to be fair to them, it's not a problem they deal with most of the time)

 

[CuriousTomCat]

Surely you'd still need multiple payment methods and physical addresses.

Unless retailers are really inept at dealing with this problem (to be fair to them, it's not a problem they deal with most of the time)

Where's the incentive for retailers to spend £££ developing a system so only gamers bought a console? It's not like gamers will send them a bunch of flowers to say thanks.

Perhaps if retailers could recoup that money by adding £20 to the cost of each console. But then they would be accused of scalping.

 

[4k4uNuNu]

Very short term thinking there, TomCat.

Sure, making money now is good for the books, but a business is built on more than making money in the short term (that's what scalpers do). PR is more important than ever in a world of social media platforms.

 

[CuriousTomCat]

Very short term thinking there, TomCat.

Sure, making money now is good for the books, but a business is built on more than making money in the short term (that's what scalpers do). PR is more important than ever in a world of social media platforms.

OCUK do a lot for forum members. They're even offering discount codes for forum members as well as the free postage. But what has that done for PR? Not much. People are still calling them scalpers etc. and saying negative things.

Retailers can bend over backwards for the consumer but some will still be unhappy.

 

[DeliciousStorage]

Blaming the buyers for scalpers existing is like blaming little old ladies for scam callers existing. I'd never buy from scalpers nor do I know anyone who would, If I hadn't managed to get my PS5 on release day I'd quite happily keep using a PS4 and wait. I imagine that the majority of people buying from scalpers are people who don't know any better, e.g. parents getting their kids the console or GPU they want and not understanding how overpriced it is. Sure there will be some people who just impatient or very wealthy, but they are likely a minority.

 

[Dirk Diggler]

Blaming the buyers for scalpers existing is like blaming little old ladies for scam callers existing. I'd never buy from scalpers nor do I know anyone who would, If I hadn't managed to get my PS5 on release day I'd quite happily keep using a PS4 and wait. I imagine that the majority of people buying from scalpers are people who don't know any better, e.g. parents getting their kids the console or GPU they want and not understanding how overpriced it is. Sure there will be some people who just impatient or very wealthy, but they are likely a minority.

There's no way that ignorance is a major factor here. Someone buying a 3080 for £1500 knows exactly how much it should cost.

There's some serious mental gymnastics going on in this thread.

 

[DeliciousStorage]

There's no way that ignorance is a major factor here. Someone buying a 3080 for £1500 knows exactly how much it should cost.

There's some serious mental gymnastics going on in this thread.

No way to know for sure either way, agree to disagree. Even if you are correct and the majority understand how much they should be, but they really just can't wait a year or two for stock issues to be resolved, unless they are all wealthy enough to retire then you could argue that they have some form of mental disability that is getting taken advantage of, therefore they cannot be held responsible.

 

[McGraw]

Does every method of making money have to add value or provide a service to someone in order to be recognised as valid and w worthwhile profession?

If that's the case, some bankers are in for some awkward conversations!

There are plenty of exploitative ways of making money that people are perfectly happy to accept, but as soon as it infringes on someone's ability to purchase a luxury item that they want not need, it's suddenly a problem.

can you provide an example of exploitative ways of making money that the average person is happy to accept?

 

[CuriousTomCat]

can you provide an example of exploitative ways of making money that the average person is happy to accept?

• Online casinos
• Credit card companies
• Mobile phone contracts with a "free" iPhone
• Time share appartments
• Gold rush nugget buckets
• Tobacco

 

[Dirk Diggler]

No way to know for sure either way, agree to disagree. Even if you are correct and the majority understand how much they should be, but they really just can't wait a year or two for stock issues to be resolved, unless they are all wealthy enough to retire then you could argue that they have some form of mental disability that is getting taken advantage of, therefore they cannot be held responsible.

Some mental disability being taken advantage of? Seriously?

Sorry, but that's ridiculous.