Black Library fiction The End and the Death - Volume III

[Halandaar]

15 minutes ago, crimsondave said:

I think the fact they knew the scalpers were skipping the Que and they still put the are you human test to enter the Que instead of at checkout puts most of the blame on GW.  At least make them work for it.  The scalpers literally did the exact same thing with success.

 

I appreciate that everyone is frustrated and that GW has not done a great job, but no. "Most of the blame" is on the people doing an organised industrial-level hitjob on a website to deny genuine buyers access to a product so they can hoover it up and sell for profit (and then brag about how successful their operation was on their socials). 

 

GW haven't done enough to try and stop it, sure. But when JD Sports get raided by a horde of kids in balaclavas you don't blame the store for not having barbed wire and machine gun nests at the door; the people doing the thing are the ones who deserve the lions share of the blame, not the company on the receiving end.

[Sabadin]

14 minutes ago, Halandaar said:

But when JD Sports get raided by a horde of kids in balaclavas you don't blame the store for not having barbed wire and machine gun nests at the door;

True, but if the kids just casually walk in the back door after hours because they couldn't be bothered to install a lock, then you blame the store.

[Doghouse]

2 hours ago, Petitioner's City said:

 

Disgusting if true!

 

That's crazy, that's about 375 copies through that site alone out of a 2.5k print run.

[Halandaar]

9 minutes ago, Sabadin said:

True, but if the kids just casually walk in the back door after hours because they couldn't be bothered to install a lock, then you blame the store.

 

In this somewhat painful analogy, the store is open for business and actively trying to welcome legitimate customers, and the kids are storming the front door en masse shoving those legitimate customers aside to get in. It's not a matter of the store being closed and empty with the back door hanging open at night.

[Bryan Blaire]

8 minutes ago, Halandaar said:

In this somewhat painful analogy, the store is open for business and actively trying to welcome legitimate customers, and the kids are storming the front door en masse shoving those legitimate customers aside to get in. It's not a matter of the store being closed and empty with the back door hanging open at night.

So stores have been successfully sued for not adequately controlling crowds due to “storming the front door” during retail operations when folks have been trampled or otherwise injured - that would mean that company does bear some amount of the blame.

 

Difference here is there’s no actual physical injury that can be shown/proven to have occurred on store property and the cops can’t pick up the kids for battery against the customers legitimately and calmly waiting in line.

 

Both parties can still be wrong and bear equal blame at the same time, and the “lion’s share” doesn’t apply to either of them.

Edited January 24 by Bryan Blaire

[lansalt]

Given that the scalpers are actually breaking the store to get in first with their bots, I wonder if they've technically commited a computer crime that GW could use to go legally after them.

This goes beyond the right of re-selling legally bought items, and these individuals seem to be based in the UK, not in a foreign jurisdiction in Russia or whatever.

[Etruscan]

So is there any consensus on just how many were bought by scalpers this time around?

 

I'm tempted to write another pissy email to GW but given that they didn't bother responding to the last two I'm wondering what the point is. 

[Marshal Rohr]

17 minutes ago, lansalt said:

Given that the scalpers are actually breaking the store to get in first with their bots, I wonder if they've technically commited a computer crime that GW could use to go legally after them.

This goes beyond the right of re-selling legally bought items, and these individuals seem to be based in the UK, not in a foreign jurisdiction in Russia or whatever.

You can report Resell Vault to your local authorities but it’s unlikely they will be able to have the discord taken down or dismantle to tools the scalpers are using. 

[Matcap86]

11 minutes ago, Etruscan said:

So is there any consensus on just how many were bought by scalpers this time around?

 

I'm tempted to write another pissy email to GW but given that they didn't bother responding to the last two I'm wondering what the point is. 

On FB There are some screenshots floating around of a scalper discord that claims "they've cleaned house" and to not put copies on ebay until they have a shipping notification.

[Etruscan]

2 minutes ago, Matcap86 said:

On FB There are some screenshots floating around of a scalper discord that claims "they've cleaned house" and to not put copies on ebay until they have a shipping notification.

 

That's just so disheartening.

[lansalt]

11 minutes ago, Marshal Rohr said:

You can report Resell Vault to your local authorities but it’s unlikely they will be able to have the discord taken down or dismantle to tools the scalpers are using. 

I think they could legally make discord give them the logs and info of the people involved to sue them (like what happened with that Ukraine war intelligence leak a year ago), but I guess it's too much effort for a petty crime at worst. The lawyers would be more expensive than the profit from the books.

[Mechanicus Tech-Support]

14 minutes ago, Matcap86 said:

On FB There are some screenshots floating around of a scalper discord that claims "they've cleaned house" and to not put copies on ebay until they have a shipping notification.

That screenshots also been posted in the BL section here

[crimsondave]

1 hour ago, Halandaar said:

 

I appreciate that everyone is frustrated and that GW has not done a great job, but no. "Most of the blame" is on the people doing an organised industrial-level hitjob on a website to deny genuine buyers access to a product so they can hoover it up and sell for profit (and then brag about how successful their operation was on their socials). 

 

GW haven't done enough to try and stop it, sure. But when JD Sports get raided by a horde of kids in balaclavas you don't blame the store for not having barbed wire and machine gun nests at the door; the people doing the thing are the ones who deserve the lions share of the blame, not the company on the receiving end.

There is a term for doing the exact same thing and expecting a different result.

[Tastyfish]

3 hours ago, TheArtilleryman said:

 

Jeez they aren’t even subtle about it are they …. 

 

That was from last time at least, the date is Jan 14th isn't it? I think we just saw those ones get sold off.

[Matcap86]

21 minutes ago, Mechanicus Tech-Support said:

That screenshots also been posted in the BL section here

I'm afraid to go there until I actually read the book

[Mechanicus Tech-Support]

oh its in the coming soon section which should be..moderately safe hehe

Edited January 24 by Mechanicus Tech-Support

[Doghouse]

It's just dawned on me that they knew scalpers were an issue so decided to announce those copies they had taken back were to be put on sale but this time at the same time globally. Meaning rather than regional windows you had people from all over the world furiously logging in at the same time, frustrated that they missed out last time and GW didn't see their new site everyone complains about would crash?

 

And then the scalpers took most of it again?

 

 

 

[Orion]

I'm out of the loop with books. 

 

Can't they just make them unlimited MTO for a week and then just ship all copies at the same time 6 months down the road?

How does that negatively impact anyone other than scalpers?

There's still timed FOMO. GW still get to "sellout" at the end of the run. People actually get their books.

Heck, if resellers want to try their luck on flipping a MTO they still can. But it gives everyone else a fighting chance.

[Sothalor]

7 minutes ago, Orion said:

I'm out of the loop with books. 

 

Can't they just make them unlimited MTO for a week and then just ship all copies at the same time 6 months down the road?

How does that negatively impact anyone other than scalpers?

There's still timed FOMO. GW still get to "sellout" at the end of the run. People actually get their books.

Heck, if resellers want to try their luck on flipping a MTO they still can. But it gives everyone else a fighting chance.

 

I think part of it is that doing a MTO run entails more logistical work and coordination - it requires collating order numbers and then working with the printer to produce that many copies. It may result in inconsistent order numbers (for example, see how quickly SoT LEs sell out versus DoF). That takes more time and money.

 

It is ultimately simpler for GW to just order up a consistent fixed number each run. And let's face it, they really don't care who ends up with the product, as long as they get their money.

[excelite]

What do they hope for when waiting for listing them? Do they really believe GW found out through looking at eBay what was going on?

 

I honestly hope some of them will be blacklisted, shouldn’t be too hard to figure out who was scalping 

[Halandaar]

9 hours ago, Bryan Blaire said:

So stores have been successfully sued for not adequately controlling crowds due to “storming the front door” during retail operations when folks have been trampled or otherwise injured - that would mean that company does bear some amount of the blame.

 

Like when McDonalds were successfully sued for serving hot coffee? You'll have to forgive me for not taking "what can you be sued for in America" as the gold standard for who takes the blame in a situation where one party is actively trying to disrupt the operations of the other for their own financial gain.

 

4 hours ago, excelite said:

What do they hope for when waiting for listing them? Do they really believe GW found out through looking at eBay what was going on?

 

I honestly hope some of them will be blacklisted, shouldn’t be too hard to figure out who was scalping 

 

Presumably it just prevents them from having to issue refunds if the orders get cancelled from under them again, nothing more.

 

Sadly I think if it was straightforward to stop people doing it then ticket touts wouldn't exist, and yet they are just as prevalent in today's world of coordinated backlash as they have ever been.

Edited January 25 by Halandaar

[Lord_Ikka]

10 minutes ago, Halandaar said:

Like when McDonalds were successfully sued for serving hot coffee? You'll have to forgive me for not taking "what can you be sued for in America" as the gold standard for who takes the blame in a situation where one party is actively trying to disrupt the operations of the other for their own financial gain.

Quick off-topic aside, but the McDonald's "Hot Coffee" lawsuit was not really a frivolous one. The woman in it received third-degree burns and required skin grafts/two years of medical care. There wouldn't have been a lawsuit if McDonald's had paid her 20k medical bills, but because they didn't, they wound up paying over 600k (originally the jury awarded the plaintiff 2.7mil, but it was reduced by the judge). The publicity and popular comments at the time labelled it a frivolous suit, but most legal scholars view it as a good suit. Personally, my opinion is that if Mickey D's had just paid the 20k they would have got off much lighter. 

 

Anyway- it's doubtful that any sort of suit would go through vs GW here. They put in a queue, made the LE edition one per customer, and then went back and made sure it really was a one per customer arrangement by removing the orders from customers using the same delivery address/payment method. I don't agree with how GW handles LEs, but they are pretty much covered as far as a lawsuit would go. 

[TheArtilleryman]

Still think physical stores are the way to go. I know this would rule out people in countries where they don’t have a store but it would at least guarantee most purchases would be genuine

[Halandaar]

23 minutes ago, TheArtilleryman said:

Still think physical stores are the way to go. I know this would rule out people in countries where they don’t have a store but it would at least guarantee most purchases would be genuine

 

Yeah. I mean not being able to buy it because you don't live near a physical store is no worse than not being able to buy it because you're shut out of the online store.

 

At least in store there's no way people can dodge the 1-per-customer limit: a scalper might have enough disguises, fake names and secondary addresses to do it but they can't take the first hundred positions in the queue with their one physical body.

 

It wouldn't completely prevent people buying to resell, but it would vastly reduce the prevalence of it.

 

32 minutes ago, Lord_Ikka said:

Quick off-topic aside, but the McDonald's "Hot Coffee" lawsuit was not really a frivolous one. 

 

Shall we go the route of burglars suing homeowners for injuries sustained while trying to rob them? You don't get injured if you aren't in the process of trying to commit a crime. The point is that litigation in the world's most litigious society is not necessarily a valid indicator for blame and I am not prepared to accept that a hypothetical shop failing to prevent harm from an actual riot, which is clearly outside the bounds of reasonable risk assessment, is worthy of the same level of derision as the people actually doing the rioting.

Edited January 25 by Halandaar

[Arbedark]

The general reaction to this from the Warhammer Community has got to be one of the most histrionic in recent times, and it's certainly got some stiff competition.