The ethics of the resale

Not what I meant at all.

Your assumptions are about as accurate as the Goldmine Record Price Guide.

 

Please don't make it sound as if anyone is unwilling to pay for music. I'm more than happy to put money in the artist's pocket. But when someone scalps a $50 dollar ticket for $200, none of the extra profit goes to the artist - and neither does it go to the venue or anyone else involved in the whole process of bringing live music to our eyes and ears. So, I'd drop that tone if I were you, since I think we all appreciate the value and worth of music. And when we pony up for something, we make sure the money goes into the right hands (i.e. those involved in the production and distribution of the music), and not to some guy on the sidelines wanting to make a quick buck off the artist's work.

 

And yet,pre disaster,in fact every second,every minute of every normal day,the bottler is tapping into local water supply as their source,having paid whatever the municipality has set,and sends bottled tap water which has gone through some kind of purification system(not necessarily making it better)to market.The water is eventually sold through another party or two and a truly unethical profit.And folks from the area buy at the store and say"Thanks." for the privledge of rebuying their municipality water in a plastic bottle.
We don't call THESE entreprenuers thieves;we call them Nestle,Niagra,Pepsico and Coca-Cola and a few others.

 

The answer to your first question is no. I was not familiar with the sonic aspects nor did I care because I was not yet back into vinyl; I didn't even have a turntable at the time. I don't think I made that move until about 2003 or 2004. I'm pretty sure I paid $50 each for Zep I and Zep III, $60 for Zep II. Why is it of interest to you? I paid what I was comfortable paying, like everyone else. Were the people I bought those LPs from 'unethical"? A market was established, as it always is, and people will get what they can for things they want to sell. If they ask too much for an item they are trying to sell they won't get the sale. PERIOD. It does not matter if it is an individual consumer or a business; the same holds true in terms of the market.

Your ideas about what is ethical and what is not have no basis in reality. See Eddiel's reply on top of yours. See my post #195 about the most basic aspects of running a business. Your position is untenable because there is no such thing as any sort of Grand Arbiter other than the market.

Nothing artificially effects supply and demand in a market where people are free to participate in that market or not do so. No matter what price is charged there are going to be people who decide to participate (I.e., buy) and others who do not. Retail is too much for some people and they choose not to participate. People decide not to pay for things all the time. ONCE AGAIN, we're talking about a collector's market here, not a source of drinking water, not access to health care, not education.

 

What a bag. If I were that other guy, I would have asked you if I could buy some of those titles from YOU - after you bought them from the guy running the yard sale. You'd have made a nice on-the-spot profit and I'd score a few audiophile album.

 

And? He paid for them. He's tying up his capital.

I think a lot of the people here ought to look into what happened in the sports card market. Lots of people took risks with their money thinking they were going to make out down the road. Then the market collapsed. How do you respond to that? They got what they deserved? That's how I respond to it.

There is a risk to capital in any market, but especially so in a collector's market.

 

I came in from Record Store Day half an hour ago. I visited two Record Theater sites locally both large stores--the last two of what had once been a five or six store regional chain in upstate NY.

The one store, just up the street from me, and across the street from the original --Main St.-- campus of SUNY Buffalo, had a line roughly 150 people long at five minutes to opening (10 a.m.). I drove down to the city location ten minutes down Main St. Arriving there five minutes past opening the line was well more than 100 people long. By 10:15 the line had not moved an inch but within five minutes of me getting in at the end of the line, it had moved maybe 6-8 feet. I stood there for another five minutes and a couple of people came walking by from the front of the line and said they were letting in ten people at a time. It was going to take an hour at least at that rate, certainly not less than thirty minutes so I split. Just not worth the wait.

Came back down Main and passing the location closer to me I saw that there was no line so apparently the two stores were not utilizing the same policy (both stores, BTW, are very large stores easily able to accommodate the numbers of people in line OTHER THAN the fact that there is only one register to check out!). Parked, went in.

Madness! The line at the register was long, serpentine in fact. From the register in the front of the store, it extended down the sidewall aisle to the back of the store, back up the next aisle, then around the end-cap display and back down the next aisle to the back of the store. People were crunched up with their prospective purchases in hand. I checked all of the possible spots for the one title I was interested in (Yardbirds Little Games) and came up empty. I'll go back later when the crowds thin out. Drove home, went to EBay and found a copy for $40, Buy It Now. There were copies listed on auction and prices and auction end-times varied. Buy it now prices as high as $99. Those sellers did not get my money. The market determined a fair price in my eyes and for my money.

That miserable scoundrel who put that brutally unethical $40 price tag on there (+$4 shipping)? Thank you, whoever you are.

 

It's only unethical if someone else doesn't buy the record at that price and he decides to just hoard it. Otherwise, whatever it is selling for is fair market value. People have a right to make money. It's not like he's selling heroin to middle school kids. Now THAT would be unethical.

Just be patient and wait a while. You'll see the prices go down on eBay. I would never buy a RSD release on eBay the same day. You end up bidding against people (like yourself) who are freaking out about not getting something on their RSD list. Once all those people get their copies (and pay a ridiculous sum of money in the process), the market will adjust itself and you'll certainly be able to find copies for right around retail price.

Heck, I was in a bind for cash a couple months ago and ended up selling a bunch of RSD purchases from last year that were still sealed in the classifieds section. And I ended up getting just about what a paid for them last year.

I'll be honest, I have no qualms with reselling something for profit. But in that case I looked around and saw what the items were selling for at the time and priced them accordingly. And not that it really matters, but I didn't buy them to flip them. I just realized that if hadn't already listened to them by then that they probably wouldn't be missed that much.

 

Except when someone wants the concert ticket, CD, vinyl, etc really bad and are willing to pay whatever their wallet will bear to obtain it. In that case, does it matter who's the middleman, whose palm is getting greased, etc? If Joe Blow is willing to pay $200 for the $50 ticket, does it matter to him who gets what slice of the pie? What about bands that dump tickets right into Stubhub?

 

That's really a separate issue, though. The poster above was implying that those who talk about ethics do so because they don't want to pay for music - an idea that is patently absurd. Just because Joe Blow wants to pay $200 for a $50 ticket doesn't mean I have to - and it certainly doesn't make me cheap!

 

When I resell on ebay,it's always the former.I have a goodly size stash of records I bought at thrift stores and yard sales just to resell,all are duplicates,or records by people I don't personally collect.Every so often,I go through and pull a couple of dozen to list on ebay.That's one thing,but buying a brand new RSD record for $19.99,and immediately listing it on ebay for $100 or more,is just plain nuts.Not to mention depriving others who want to own the record.I don't the two types of reselling should be lumped together.RSD flippers are the lowest form of scum on the face of the earth.

 

personally i can't be bothered to make the effort it takes to get to the store and buy them for resale so imho fair play to those that can be and good luck to them ..... otherwise maybe we should also question the morals of record companies who rehashed so many greatest hits compilations over the years to make a quick buck or million, that was also profiteering in my book.. but immoral really ??

 

In that scenario, though, the buck goes back to the record company, who can then reinvest it in the business and by extension bring us more music. Your average scalper, on the other hand, will maybe get a steak for dinner - who knows?

 

lol true, but they have worked for their steak hehe !!

 

I bought an album yesterday with the sole intention of keeping it but since it's selling for $150 now, I will sell it. Is that unethical?

 

But aren't you also depriving people of records they might want to own with your own Goodwill buying and then selling behaviour? Heck, you're even taking records you don't want to listen to! There is no different between what you are doing and what the RSD people are doing because the end result is essentially the same. What is the difference then? Price?

I'm not surprised that you've decided they shouldn't be lumped in together since you actively participate in one and not the other despite the fact they are the same thing.

I'd have a lot more sympathy for the anti-flipping crowd if they were able to present an argument that isn't filled with so many exceptions so they can absolve themselves of the same behaviour their putting down other people for.

 

I am not surprised that my original post has yielded 10 pages so far. It is an emotional subject. I have no problem with an out of print album increasing in value and selling for far more than the original price. That is fair market value. However, what about a third party that buys up a quantity of a particular title (e.g. Dave Pick #10) for the sole purpose of reselling it at huge mark up. Is there a responsibility to the distributor to limit purchase quantities? To not limit production? What is to stop a third party from buying out the entire supply of an album and then reselling?

 

Nope - not at all. It's a free world and you can sell it for whatever price you want. Sell now - it might depreciate after awhile.

 

This question is directed to Raylinds. Ray, after reading some of the invective and name calling being thrown around in this and other Record Store Day related threads, do you still seriously want to invite some of these people to your home? I wouldn't do it in a million years.

 

This gets into what I would like to see happen--the limiting of quantities sold to any one purchaser. I don't know what the number would or should be but I think it would be providing a service to the consumer.

On the other hand, if I am the business that is in business to make money and I do a calculation that I can move "X" units in order to achieve my target profit ratios, then I am quite thrilled to see all of that product moved as soon as humanly possible.

 

I just paid stupid money for Dick's Picks 36. Somebody had one and I had to outbid a few other people who were obviously quite bent on obtaining the title. What the market will bear! The seller has got to be very happy today.

 

We are for the most part hobbyists who spend an alarming amount of money on music, both new and used. Mostly, we spend a lot of money on things that drop in value. Sometimes it increases in value although speaking from personal experience, this is the exception rather than the rule. If by some sort of accident I have forgotten that I bought a pink Mofi Sea Change and want to sell it, I see no problem with that and neither should you.

 

Buying when supply is high and demand is low and reselling when supply is low and demand is high is certainly a tenet of capitalism, so I don't buy the arguments that it somehow violates the free market. However, just because something is legal doesn't make it ethical. There are factors other than money, such as the desire for goodwill that exists among lovers of music, that are at play in these types of situations, and anyone who violates these ethical boundaries can certainly be vilified by the community.

 

Emphasis and enlargement mine....

Greed IS immoral to me.

A major, major problem in society....and wish the mind was stronger and avoided this poor reality.

It also carries over in competition....win at all costs, run up the score, be NUMBER ONE or you ain't **** !!!

The few cd's I've sold here, none I've listed, but when I've seen someone looking for one...I've sold for less than HALF of what I've seen 'advertised' by others here. I could get 'what the market would bear' in some instances, but why ?....I got them for a pittance and passed along the savings and didn't gouge at all.

 

It is the same as scalping a ticket, but ticket scalping is unethical too. It is not the free market at work, it is a perversion of the free market. It creates artificial scarcity, artificial prices (which crash when the product is sold), deprives others of buying opportunity, and creates an inefficient middleman who does not add any value himself. It is arguably worse than ticket scalping, because tickets to an event are really limited (they are only good until the show is over), whereas there is no real limit to Dave's Picks pressings except the Dead's own arbitrary self-limitation.

One difference between dying rich and dying poor is knowing the real value of things. I may love the Dead until the bitter end, but it isn't worth stuffing some guy's pockets with my very hard earned bread. Filling a hole isn't worth it. Besides, the Dead are ultimately responsible for the scalpers.

The Dead could stop this profiteering themselves, simply by not limiting the pressings, and letting demand decide the pressing run. (They are also perverting the free market by limiting a resource that is not limited-- they can crank out as many as they want) If they need to limit the run, they can without announcing it as a selling point. If they did that, the Dave's Picks scalpers would be out of business, the market would regain efficiency, and they would have taken an ethical stance to wipe out an unethical practice at no cost to themselves. Except that they might not be able to sell ancient concerts as such high prices themselves, if they didn't claim to limit the pressings. What the Dead does is not unlike what the Franklin Mint does with its commemorative coins, or Hummel does with figurines. They create artificial scarcity, but no intrinsic value. The items usually have a much lower resale value than purchase price.