Thailand Floods: HDD Prices To Remain Extortionately High As Supplies Get Tighter

[Easy Rhino]

the article itself is pretty good, i just take issue with the title as it is misleading. qubit you have to understand people will react negatively to you injecting your bias into a news article. people want facts so they can make up their own mind.

i dont think these prices are extortionately high so i don't believe you should have used that word. i believe the prices are actually an accurate reflection of market price after a major disaster. a good title would have been "HDD prices to remain high as supplies tighten."

 

[Jarman]

whatever they are, they are beyond what I am willing to pay

 

[Easy Rhino]

whatever they are, they are beyond what I am willing to pay

you and just about everyone else. disasters like this really hurt companies (even those that can recoup some of the loss through insurance policies.) hopefully we will see companies rethink their strategy and start opening HDD plants in other areas of the world.

 

[digibucc]

i didn't think extortionately was a word - that's what i took from this article

 

[qubit]

the article itself is pretty good, i just take issue with the title as it is misleading. qubit you have to understand people will react negatively to you injecting your bias into a news article. people want facts so they can make up their own mind.

i dont think these prices are extortionately high so i don't believe you should have used that word. i believe the prices are actually an accurate reflection of market price after a major disaster. a good title would have been "HDD prices to remain high as supplies tighten."

Thanks, I'm glad I got something right.

Yes, your title works, it's accurate and it's fine, but it's bland and I don't do bland. I think extortionately does apply to this, so it all just boils down to... opinion. Again, lol. It gets across the "WTF!!" factor any poor buyer in the market for a hard drive right now feels. I think this is just splitting hairs now, seriously. Hard drives are very expensive right now, regardless of the exact words one uses.

Can we call a truce now please?!

 

[n-ster]

whatever. i just have different expectations for news i guess. but i won't stop bringing up my issues with his news in his news thread. if i read something i know to be incorrect im going to call him out on it. otherwise he will never learn to tone down the rhetoric and write professionally.

I don't mind you calling him out, I mind you calling him out HERE... qubit said it again and I'll say in another time, this is not the place for these comments. Why? It derails the thread and it craps the thread (and by that I do not mean you posts are crap, I mean that the thread is derailed and gone in a completely different direction). TBH I see your point. I like qubit's style but not everyone does, but people mistakenly think the qubit doesn't know this. HE KNOWS. There are many places where you can call him out, including PMs, "what's wrong with our forum" and "Our News, your views" threads.

This is why mods usually try to stop the MAC vs PC and INTEL vs AMD comments as they derail threads. The qubit vs not qubit style is what happened here. I mean look at the thread! You can't in all honesty tell me this "calling out" didn't derail the thread

the article itself is pretty good, i just take issue with the title as it is misleading. qubit you have to understand people will react negatively to you injecting your bias into a news article. people want facts so they can make up their own mind.

i dont think these prices are extortionately high so i don't believe you should have used that word. i believe the prices are actually an accurate reflection of market price after a major disaster. a good title would have been "HDD prices to remain high as supplies tighten."

Isn't high technically an opinion too? You could see HDD prices being a steal, and now they are less cheap or normal. Yes the prices are higher, but not necessarily high. I admit the word "remain" neutralizes this point somewhat. Just trying to point out there can be "opinion" in many news titles that you might find appropriate.

Again though, the "extortionately" can mean with extortion, but it can also mean that it exceeds the customary, and the later is true and perhaps the best neutral way of saying it.

 

[erocker]

I don't mind you calling him out, I mind you calling him out HERE... qubit said it again and I'
ll say in another time, this is not the place for these comments. Why? It derails the thread and it craps the thread (and by that I do not mean you posts are crap, I mean that the thread is derailed and gone in a completely different direction). TBH I see your point. I like qubit's style but not everyone does, but people mistakenly think the qubit doesn't know this. HE KNOWS. There are many places where you can call him out, including PMs, "what's wrong with our forum" and "Our News, your views" threads.

This is why mods usually try to stop the MAC vs PC and INTEL vs AMD comments as they derail threads. The qubit vs not qubit style is what happened here. I mean look at the thread! You can't in all honesty tell me this "calling out" didn't derail the thread



Isn't high technically an opinion too? You could see HDD prices being a steal, and now they are less cheap or normal. Yes the prices are higher, but not necessarily high. I admit the word "remain" neutralizes this point somewhat. Just trying to point out there can be "opinion" in many news titles that you might find appropriate.

Again though, the "extortionately" can mean with extortion, but it can also mean that it exceeds the customary, and the later is true and perhaps the best neutral way of saying it.

I think qubit can defend himself. Let's get back on topic now.

 

[Neuromancer]

Back On topic, to both the article and the title.

Extortion is an apt description of the event. A high price is above market value, extortion is a forced and excessive payment, because no option is left for you. Since retailers unilaterally tripled cost, before shortage even occurred, this is price gouging, something that happens on new releases, and when shortages occur. It is not justified, and you know prices will fall to what they really should have been adjusted to based on the articles predicted 25% impact on supply. Fact is that these retailers did NOT pay the price they are charging at the minute, so yes.. not illegal just dubious as hell and should not be supported.

I will cinch my data belt and wait till prices fall back down to appropriate levels before I purchase a HDD for myself.

As to the title, despite its apropos connotations, when people use excessive adjectives in their assessments I tend to dismiss their opinions as juvenile. And that is what it sounds like a teenager writing a news article. (No offense qubit, I do not mean your wording I mean in generally, sensationalist words smack of youthful or ignorant writing.. ). similar consternations would be applied to those that think "Intel murders/rapes/slaughters AMD or crushes, demoralizes, or takes your mother out for a nice seafood dinner and never calls her again!" type of comments.

*free cookie for the first person to name the movie of that last part

(Sorry for the wordy post, I am in writing mode right now)

 

[n-ster]

I think qubit can defend himself. Let's get back on topic now.

I know he can, but Easy Rhino was divulging his opinion, I was merely counting his opinions with mine

Back On topic, to both the article and the title.

Extortion is an apt description of the event. A high price is above market value, extortion is a forced and excessive payment, because no option is left for you. Since retailers unilaterally tripled cost, before shortage even occurred, this is price gouging, something that happens on new releases, and when shortages occur. It is not justified, and you know prices will fall to what they really should have been adjusted to based on the articles predicted 25% impact on supply. Fact is that these retailers did NOT pay the price they are charging at the minute, so yes.. not illegal just dubious as hell and should not be supported.

I will cinch my data belt and wait till prices fall back down to appropriate levels before I purchase a HDD for myself.

As to the title, despite its apropos connotations, when people use excessive adjectives in their assessments I tend to dismiss their opinions as juvenile. And that is what it sounds like a teenager writing a news article. (No offense qubit, I do not mean your wording I mean in generally, sensationalist words smack of youthful or ignorant writing.. ). similar consternations would be applied to those that think "Intel murders/rapes/slaughters AMD or crushes, demoralizes, or takes your mother out for a nice seafood dinner and never calls her again!" type of comments.

*free cookie for the first person to name the movie of that last part

(Sorry for the wordy post, I am in writing mode right now)

Anchorman is the movie

now imana write my post but I wanted to be first lol

What the retailers did was not extortion IMO... It is as simple as supply and demand. If they had kept their prices low, they would have lost precious stock they have. They priced up HDDs to slow down the demand in order to keep enough stock for the months to come. If they didn't, we'd be out of HDDs during the Christmas shopping which is very bad

Extortionately =/= extortion btw

One of the definitions of extortionately is exceeding the customary. That is exactly what the prices of HDDs are right now, and it is the best way to describe it. Even "remain high" is less correct than "exceeds the customary". Using the turn of phrase would have made the title bland, hence the synonym

 

[Easy Rhino]

i guess they don't teach economics in school anymore.

a disaster of this magnitude first effects the manufacturer. supply is now limited so the price naturally increases to retain some sort of revenue. the retailers then fight each other to acquire as much of the product as possible. this immediately shoots the retail price through the roof as a bidding war begins for the short supply. as a way to off set the long term costs retailers raise the price on their current stock so they have more cash to bid on the short supply. retailers know that some consumers will pay the higher costs because those consumers have a higher demand for the product while others will wait. retailers capitalize on their high demand customers who build a higher cost into their own products and services. this actually softens the blow as the total cost is now spread out to a wider group of people. as supply begins to come back the cost to retailers will decrease adding certainty in the marketplace. costs will then go down for consumers as prices reach an equilibrium for the greatest population of consumer demand.

tldr; it isn't extortion.

 

[qubit]

Nice bit of economics 101, Easy.

I couldn't explain it quite like that.

 

[Easy Rhino]

as consumers we often focus on the retailers and say they are gouging us. remember though that retailers are consumers too! they are buying from the manufacturers and other retailers some times.

if prices on HDDs crash (much lower than they were before the disaster) when the disaster is all cleaned up and people are back to work then we will know the retailers overcharged for their limited stock to the consumer. this is bad for the retailers because they lose on the initial high cost after the disaster and they lose after the disaster because they can't charge enough for the HDDs. it behooves retailers to keep prices as low as they possibly can during a disaster to avoid that.

 

[n-ster]

My simplistic mind did not think of the scenario as detailed as that lol. I didn't think of some of the factors you mentioned

My ECON 1000 class I'm taking didn't cover disasters yet lol, but I'm only 1/4 into the class (a full year class)

At least I came to the same conclusion LOL

 

[imitation]

Well, for now prices are just insane (here in Germany). I bought a bunch of Seagate 500GB 3,5" drives for 28€ a piece half a year ago. Now, the cheapest drive available is a Samsung 1TB 2,5" for 80€, and the aforementioned Seagate is pinned at 135€. Until 500GB cost somewhere close to 30 or 40€ again, i'll refuse to call this "normal".
This is madness!!!

 

[fullhd99]

WDC hdd prices rose very crazy
because the factory drowned due to flooding

in my country
before Internal 3,5" WDC Green 2TB SATA6 price $90
After flood disaster price $150

Bonus

Spoiler

 

[n-ster]

WDC hdd prices rose very crazy
because the factory drowned due to flooding

in my country
before Internal 3,5" WDC Green 2TB SATA6 price $90
After flood disaster price $150

Bonus

Spoiler

http://www.enterkomputer.com/images/wdflood.jpg

That is less of a rise than most other countries, which saw 100+% price increase

 

[fullhd99]

That is less of a rise than most other countries, which saw 100+% price increase

only say Oh my good
in prediction hdd prices will continue to rise
many stores who have stock hdd in large quantities to take advantage of two and even three-fold,whereas at the time of purchasing stock from the manufacturer with the normal price

 

[Chappy]

They should put their factories at the top of the world.

 

[qubit]

They should put their factories at the top of the world.

http://thestrategyguysite.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/Top_of_the_world.jpg

OMG he's not afraid of heights is he?! I'd turn to jelly up there.

 

[Chappy]

OMG he's not afraid of heights is he?! I'd turn to jelly up there.

I doubt you will, you won't be able to see the ground up there. Even people with Acrophobia won't trigger their fears as there will be no ground to fall to...
Just look into the clouds

Anyway how funny it would look if they make a hdd factory up there.