It was better than clicking “Next” every second for 45 minutes trying to check out, and then failing to get one. Nothing can truly stop scalpers except the original seller doing the scalping themselves with a reverse auction.
What I mean
I’m not suggesting this is a good system. Hence I’m hiding it in a spoiler. Imagine if Valve launched the sale, and priced the machine at like $2100 (base model), and that started ticking down. Well, the rich idiots who just have to have one buy it for that price, and more normal people buy it after it drops a lot. No scalper can profit if all the rich idiots already got theirs directly from Valve. Instead, Valve profits, which you could argue is better.
thingsiplay@lemmy.ml 1 week ago
Lottery system did work. It does not prevent scalpers from buying, but it gives humans, bots and scalpers the same chance to buy. They will end up selling a few units to the scalpers, just by chance, but at least they cannot buy everything; the chance of winning all lottery is effectively 0.
BlameTheAntifa@lemmy.world 1 week ago
I propose that weighting results by factors like account activity, age, “level,” and whether someone is ordering from an official Steam client instead of the website would help. Nothing stops “normal” gamers from being scalpers, but ensuring your actual, loyal customers get preference is a good way to start.
thingsiplay@lemmy.ml 1 week ago
Yes, that adds to the system. But we know scalpers had accounts back when the Steam Deck released and they probably prepared their accounts in case this happened again. Valve really need to make sure the accounts is an actual scalper and not a regular user / player (similar to making sure its an actual cheater compared to a player that looked like a cheater). And they can always purchase hacked or even pumped accounts for sale too. What I mean is, no matter what Valve does, there will always be scalpers.
And the reason why people buy from scalpers in ebay for these horrendous prices could be, because new users want to get into Steam and PC Gaming but don’t want to have a typical PC in their living room. Because of account age and level and activity rating, they are not eligible to buy one from Valve. So in a sense, these scalpers are their only hope getting one, because without a PC they cannot play games and build their activity.