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The Dark Side of the PlayStation 3 Launch
An anonymous reader writes "Kotaku is running an article prompted by an email from a foreign student in Japan. The reader unveils the sad reality of the modern gaming industry. Japanese businessmen made ample use of homeless people and Chinese nationals to obtain PS3s for re-sale. There was also a large amount of pushing and shoving, some fights, and almost no police presence at the most crowded stores." From the article: "Based on my observations of the first twenty PS3s sold at Bic Camera, they were all purchased by Chinese nationals, none of whom bought any software. After making their purchase, television crews asked for interviews but all were declined. These temporary owners of PS3s would then make their way down the street where their bosses waited. After several minutes, a dozen PS3s were rounded up, as their Japanese business manager paid out cash to those who waited in line for them. I witnessed a homeless-looking Chinese man, in his sixties or seventies get paid 20,000 yen for his services and was then sent away." Update: 11/12 05:40 GMT by Z : You're right. Sony only shares a portion of the blame here. Offsides on my part.
I fixed your typos.
They could sell all the PS3s they have available, rather than create an artificial scarcity for marketing purposes.
Is sony that create stuff like that. If you have that low numbers of units, you can sell then online, or by pre-order, so you can make a reservation for your unit. That way no one can get your unit, theres can be lines, but not pushing.
-Woof woof woof!
OMG! Somebody gave a free sandwich to a homeless person! Why didn't they just spend that sandwich money on crack, like decent people do?
... and then they built the supercollider.