Australian Parliament Subpoenas Microsoft, Apple on Price Hikes
- Thread starter Steven Bogos
- Start date
It's called grey because the publishers do not want to sell to those companies. It is perfectly legal in the country of sale but there might be a civil case in the country of purchase.Steven Bogos said:
It is the PUBLISHERS who set regional pricing. Steam, for example, has no say in how games in Australia cost more. They are told to keep the prices as they are by the publishers so the publishers can not be accused by local Australian retailers of trying to run them out of business... which actually is price fixing which IS illegal.
1. Stop using your local area as arguments; we are talking about the US average here and why we are being charged more than the US/UK/EURO (other regions like Singapore, Russia, or China it is understandable, but we're one of the few markets charged more than the average), not just 'Connecticut' (which I have no idea where it is or why it applies to a whole country's situation).Therumancer said:Akalabeth said:
Wow, someone whose actually heard of Ultima's precursor.
When it comes to digital prices I believe that a lot of it comes down to digital distributors being forced to be competitive with retail. The bottom line being that when a digital distributor undercuts brick and mortar stores it will oftentimes force them out of business. Closing businesses can have a catastrophic impact on the areas they are in due to unemployment, lost taxes and revenue, etc. Down here in Connecticut there has been a big battle between the state and Amazon (which the state won) to force Amazon.com to collect sales taxes. One big complaint being that not charging taxes (which they arguably should have been) made it impossible for physical businesses to compete, since everything else being equal buying online would not only save a trip (and gas) but also a couple of bucks in taxes. I've also heard it mentioned that Connecticut is considering making online retailers charge Connecticut residents the set retail value for products (the same as a Brick and Mortar store) to level the competitive playing field in order to try and save businesses getting clobbered by online services. This has been applied (in discussion) to games, and other media, given the beating once prosperous chains like Gamestop, Best Buy, and even video rental places have taken. I've heard they are looking to other countries for example of how to limit E-businesses, and protect real world ones.
The bottom line is that my immediate guess would be that Steam is forced to charge whatever the going retail price is in a lot of these regions, as opposed to being allowed to just undercut them. Thus the price varies with whatever the price for the physical product at a game store would be. Which is something that's under discussion for the US as well at least, and it would probably mean the end of things like Steam sales, at least in specific states, if it went through.
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As far as the bit with telecommunications infrastructure goes as I understand things in Australia you don't nessicarly pay flat fee for unlimited internet usage, in many cases your charged by the amount of data you transfer, getting so much as part of your service plan, and then paying a premium above it. Something that is supposed to be integral to how the whole system was set up, and one of the reasons why there have been demands for changeovers. Apparently businesses have to pay this too, and the goverment gets a cut (taxes) along with the ISPs (though it's been a while so I could have that wrong). Meaning that with Australia's way of running internet and the current infrastructure a digital service basically has to pay for the data they are sending, as does the person receiving it, in addition to the price of the product. As opposed to how in the US you pay like $15-$50 depending on the plan and speed you want and your pretty much set to do whatever you want for an entire month, whether you don't use it at all, or decide to transfer hundreds of terraflops of data.
I mean you could be right, it might not make sense, but it's one of the biggest bits of complaining I hear about from Aussies when they talk about gaming and stuff down there, the horrible state of the internet, the cost of using it, and I've definatly heard insinituations it's been affecting the digital businesses.
2. "I've heard, I've heard" that's nice, but what you just typed out is not applicable to us. At all.
3. Steam don't set the prices, publishers do. Sometimes publishers have licencing agreements with retailers, but the majority of the time they do not (especially outside of games). GMG even sells 2K Games games to break-even by giving us a permanent 30% discount due to the fact they wanted our prices inflated (at risk of losing their business altogether GMG met everyone halfway). Steam allow publishers to screw us over though, yes, by allowing regional pricing to occur for AU/NZ in the first place.
4. What the hell does the 2nd last paragraph have to do with anything?
5. Cut your posts down as they are just inane and you really have no idea what things are like down here; on the other hand, we get a healthy dose of American media every day (due to the fact that on sites like the escapist, reddit, they assume that 100% of their audience are from the USA). We can even name your President, know what your ISPs are like and name the major ones like Comcast, Verizon, and Google Fibre (in regards to charging for speeds), and know what the culture is like in the USA, but can you even name our Prime Minister or one ISP outside of Telstra?
I still wouldn't call myself qualified to try and explain something that happens in the USA, yet you think you know enough to judge us and come to any sort of rational conclusion about this issue knowing next to nothing about it? I'm doubting whether you even know about the existence of GST.
We were charged more as our AUD:USD was low (it kept slipping ever since this type of FX was initiated back in IIRC the 80's), so it was understandable paying $125 for a game like Conker's Bad Fur Day on N64. We had to pay comparatively more for products as a result, which was understandable. Then suddenly, we had the mining boom! The AUD climbed up and up; we already were a large exporter, but nothing like this before. Except, greedy corporates (thankfully no AU companies) didn't change their pricing schemes because they could get away with it (imagine the butthurt the vocal minority of Americans on the internet would have if they were being charged more than us!) so we had to buy the PS3 for $1000 (about $850 USD at the time IIRC). Yes, $1000 AUD. Eventually, we reached the situation we're at today where it kept rising to the point of 1 AUD: 1.08 USD as your dollar tanked when you were at the centre of the GFC (even though your currency is used as the common currency we still managed to pull through more or less untouched due to a number of factors).
Some distributors dropped their pricing to compensate (GMG, Amazon if you can pull through $10-30 regular shipping and the many embargoed products, GOG, basic goods like milk/bread etc), but many just left things as they were due to pure greed (Steam, 2K Games, Shippers to retailers (although thankfully Video Sleazy is importing from decent suppliers now and can get games like Hitman: Absolution for $28 pre-ordered)).
The point is, this is essentially a thread to these suppliers: Drop your prices or you can't sell your products here; which is the better alternative for them? Obviously the former, and with the dropped prices hopefully Australians can pump more of their dollars into sectors that matter more.
They have other means too. Adobe has oppenly admitted they like piracy. it makes the young people learn using thier products, and when they grow up and need, say, a drawing program for work, they will buy Photoshop, because thats the only they know how to work with, since they pirated it and learn on thier own. so then selling a overpriced Photoshop will work, because they will buy that anyway, since otherwise they would have to learn it all over again.Therumancer said:
Microsoft is sort of two way here, on one hand they said that piracy in china has allowed them to be dominant in the market, on other hand they are actively fighting it.
Apple however seems to be "your not touching our stuff" type and tries to lock costumers out of everything becasue god knows they may improve it.
Good. let the physical retailers die. they are obsolete by now. physical copies can be shipped from online stores easily, you give a good example - amazon. and for cheaper too. All retailers do is increase the price by introducing an unnecessary middleman. and you have to pay the middleman.Therumancer said:
Yet it seems the retailers are clinging teeeth and nail hellbent on not letting the eletronic sale take over. reminds me of how music industry tried to destroy the internet with their 19th century sale model being theo nly fit to them. they failed. hopefully physical retailers will fail too.
I do agree that digital sales woudl have to pay the same tax rate as physical, its only fair, but forcing their pricing is wrong. thats liek saying "you must sell your car for no less than 50.000 because we want you to pay more tax".
You do make good points and i liekd reading your replies
Capcha: om nom nom..... somehow this is very fitting.
that's why I use steam and eBay for games. Fuck spending $90 for a Wii game. I can buy two nice bottles of burboun for that, or 5/6 of a concert ticket
Oh, a simple way to bypass silly regional pricing with digital games is via the gifting system.
Simple as in you need a trustworthy friend in the United States, I guess.
They buy and gift you a game on steam, you pay them via paypal or whatever, maybe even throw in an extra dollar. Congratulations, you didn't have to pay 25% more on your purchase.
Simple as in you need a trustworthy friend in the United States, I guess.
They buy and gift you a game on steam, you pay them via paypal or whatever, maybe even throw in an extra dollar. Congratulations, you didn't have to pay 25% more on your purchase.
Australians: Why?!
Them: We wanted more money and you were willing to pay.
This just in, brilliant poster on escapist discovers reason!
... O:3
Them: We wanted more money and you were willing to pay.
This just in, brilliant poster on escapist discovers reason!
... O:3
Therumancer, your parochialism is so shocking that it's almost endearing. What exactly does Australian telecomms infrastructure have to do with the costs of digital distribution? Steam aren't running servers in Australia, their content is all mirrored by Australian ISPs. The costs of digital distribution in Australia are precisely the same costs as those of digital distribution everywhere else: a big fat capital cost to set up the content servers in the first place, followed by virtually zip in the way of marginal costs.
But hey, keep on trying to persuade us that you know anything at all about our country - it's good spectator sport, if nothing else.
OT: Obviously this isn't actually going to change anything, because the tech giants will all be able to argue/dissemble/flat-out bribe their way out of having to change their business practices, but it's still nice seeing it acknowledged by the legislature, even if it is happening about six years after the fact. Figures that it would take the growth of online shopping (and the consequent exposure of baby boomers to digital price gaps) for this to finally boil over.
But hey, keep on trying to persuade us that you know anything at all about our country - it's good spectator sport, if nothing else.
OT: Obviously this isn't actually going to change anything, because the tech giants will all be able to argue/dissemble/flat-out bribe their way out of having to change their business practices, but it's still nice seeing it acknowledged by the legislature, even if it is happening about six years after the fact. Figures that it would take the growth of online shopping (and the consequent exposure of baby boomers to digital price gaps) for this to finally boil over.
It's kind of insane that an official inquiry had to be conducted at all when everyone knows it's just been greedy assholes being greedy assholes and getting away with it all this time. The only reason no one bothered to check until now is because our government hasn't cared about this until now for whatever reason. A big part of why the aus economy is suffering isn't just the global market, its the simple fact we're being fucked HARD on prices. Why should I pay $120 for Bioshock Infinite when I can literally (and plan to soon) buy a steam code from a website for a mere $40. Can't even pay that price on Steam itself.
I have purchased maybe 3 or 5 games over the last 5 years at Aus retail stores and they were all pre-owned or discounted.
I have purchased maybe 3 or 5 games over the last 5 years at Aus retail stores and they were all pre-owned or discounted.
And I thought nobody cared. T_T
The price mark-ups are remnants of a bygone age where shipping was actually really expensive (due to us being often across a large ocean and generally not on the way to anywhere) and that was reason enough for more expensive Australian products. That hasn't been the case for decades, but we just roll with it because it's all we know. It's even more despicable now with digital content distribution, which has absolutely no reason, at all, to be more expensive than in any other country, but still is in most cases. At any rate, doubters of the truth of cheap shipping claims should ask themselves why other coverseas ountries don't also have the ridiculous prices we do.
The price mark-ups are remnants of a bygone age where shipping was actually really expensive (due to us being often across a large ocean and generally not on the way to anywhere) and that was reason enough for more expensive Australian products. That hasn't been the case for decades, but we just roll with it because it's all we know. It's even more despicable now with digital content distribution, which has absolutely no reason, at all, to be more expensive than in any other country, but still is in most cases. At any rate, doubters of the truth of cheap shipping claims should ask themselves why other coverseas ountries don't also have the ridiculous prices we do.
The cost of shipping is still a factor, and there's very likely an issue with pricing digital distribution in that the agreement with retail channels won't allow them to undercut retail sales by going any percentage cheaper through digital sales, else they risk losing their retail distribution entirely. For digital only products this shouldn't be an issue, but they may argue that some products are still affected by retail agreements and cost of shipping, and they have to maintain the relative value of those products by using the same screwed up pricing scheme for everything. The most valid challenge here is that the currency exchange rate has changed, but the prices haven't.
This really says it all. The threat of explaining causes dramatic price cuts to bring in line with other countries. I think that is a pretty blatant admission of guilt, without admitting anything. Surely if there was a justifiable reason, attending the hearing and explaining ones self wouldn't be a tough thing to do.Steven Bogos said:
And other countries still get shafted. Places like Europe still expected to pay more than Europe because "uh, why not?". Release dates are an even bigger farce where you get delays of when a game in the US is released and when a game in Europe is released, despite it being on a digital setting.Steven Bogos said:
http://www.neowin.net/news/its-cheaper-to-fly-to-the-usa-than-buy-adobe-cs6-in-australia
Great article I saw on Reddit about the same sort of issue
Great article I saw on Reddit about the same sort of issue
So because I'm Australian that makes it alright to charge me more? Just because I'm richer then you? So if a guy walks into a store looking like a bum and buys a cheeseburger, then a guy in an expensive suit walks in and buys a cheeseburger it would be fine to double the price just because the suit has more money?Little Gray said:
On behalf of most Aussies on here I'm going to ask that you stop posting about something that you have no actual facts about. First off, almost everything you say is based on what you're been told second or third hand from the aussies and kiwis in your guild, hardly a representitive sample. Secondly you don't actually contribute anything factual about the motivations behind pricing, every time you mention it its always "I believe" or "I've heard" or "My guess" or words to that effect, I have nothing against you having an opinion but an opinion based on nothing is really not an arguement its just an idea without substance.Therumancer said:Wow, someone whose actually heard of Ultima's precursor.
When it comes to digital prices I believe that a lot of it comes down to digital distributors being forced to be competitive with retail. The bottom line being that when a digital distributor undercuts brick and mortar stores it will oftentimes force them out of business. Closing businesses can have a catastrophic impact on the areas they are in due to unemployment, lost taxes and revenue, etc. Down here in Connecticut there has been a big battle between the state and Amazon (which the state won) to force Amazon.com to collect sales taxes. One big complaint being that not charging taxes (which they arguably should have been) made it impossible for physical businesses to compete, since everything else being equal buying online would not only save a trip (and gas) but also a couple of bucks in taxes. I've also heard it mentioned that Connecticut is considering making online retailers charge Connecticut residents the set retail value for products (the same as a Brick and Mortar store) to level the competitive playing field in order to try and save businesses getting clobbered by online services. This has been applied (in discussion) to games, and other media, given the beating once prosperous chains like Gamestop, Best Buy, and even video rental places have taken. I've heard they are looking to other countries for example of how to limit E-businesses, and protect real world ones.
The bottom line is that my immediate guess would be that Steam is forced to charge whatever the going retail price is in a lot of these regions, as opposed to being allowed to just undercut them. Thus the price varies with whatever the price for the physical product at a game store would be. Which is something that's under discussion for the US as well at least, and it would probably mean the end of things like Steam sales, at least in specific states, if it went through.
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As far as the bit with telecommunications infrastructure goes as I understand things in Australia you don't nessicarly pay flat fee for unlimited internet usage, in many cases your charged by the amount of data you transfer, getting so much as part of your service plan, and then paying a premium above it. Something that is supposed to be integral to how the whole system was set up, and one of the reasons why there have been demands for changeovers. Apparently businesses have to pay this too, and the goverment gets a cut (taxes) along with the ISPs (though it's been a while so I could have that wrong). Meaning that with Australia's way of running internet and the current infrastructure a digital service basically has to pay for the data they are sending, as does the person receiving it, in addition to the price of the product. As opposed to how in the US you pay like $15-$50 depending on the plan and speed you want and your pretty much set to do whatever you want for an entire month, whether you don't use it at all, or decide to transfer hundreds of terraflops of data.
I mean you could be right, it might not make sense, but it's one of the biggest bits of complaining I hear about from Aussies when they talk about gaming and stuff down there, the horrible state of the internet, the cost of using it, and I've definatly heard insinituations it's been affecting the digital businesses.
Now I'm an aussie working in IT, with businesses of various sizes and I will state categorically that your understanding of how the internet is priced and delivered in Australia is so limited that to actually use it as a justification for anything is laughable. I suggest you verify your facts before you allow insinuation to determine your understanding. For the record... In Australia residential consumers in most cases buy the internet at the maximum speed of the technology that is available (eg ADSL 2+ upto 20Mbps) and a certain data limit, once they hit this limit either they are charged a premium for any excess usage or they are speed limited for the rest of the month. Data limits range from as low as 50MB upto unlimited (TPG here offers unlimited internet for approx $70 so unlimited isn't excessively expensive either) Business connections have even more flexibility with technologies like EFM of various speeds, and fibre (in most captial cities) delivering speeds of upto 100/100. So the technology is available for consumers to download any digital purchases and for Digital retails to setup local Servers to allow for local up/downloads
Now after that explanation I still fail to see how the delivery of the digital purchase is the retailers problem. As long as the consumer is able to get to the website to make the purchase then its just a matter of time at the purchasers expense before the program is downloaded.
As a side note Australia is at about 6,000 Miles closer to China then the US is so shipping anything from most physical IT manufacturers (like Apple, Dell or Microsoft) to... well anywhere in Australia would be cheaper then shipping to the US (6,000 roughly 1/3 of the distance)
Except that physical copies of games are usually significantly cheaper to buy in Australia than their digitally delivered counterparts.Therumancer said:
It's pretty insane, actually. You can go to the local discount chain and buy a game for around $66 to $88 on Blu-Ray disc, that would cost $90 to $120 to buy online via download (and you can lend or re-sell the physical copy, unlike the downloaded version). So, physical shipping doesn't appear to be the issue - especially as the copy bought in the store involves more middle-men, what with the retailer needing to make a profit and pay for bricks-and-mortar, while the more expensive downloadable version has fewer middle-men, and fewer delivery costs.
Although the title of the article does kind of bug me when it mentions "price hikes" - which implies a sudden increase in price. This is not the case. If anything, games in Australia have gotten cheaper in recent years. Yes, there is a disparity in price compared to the US, but that's always been the case. It isn't a "hike" - it's just the way it's always been.
$45 for a decent bottle of bourbon? You obviously don't live in Australia. A good bottle of spirits is going to cost you at least $60. A great bottle of spirits is going to cost around $90 to $150+. The game will give you many more hours of entertainment, too.Evil Smurf said:
Yeah, there is your problem, I'll give you credit, you've got at least a rudimentary idea of economics, geopolitics and corporate law but lack and real defined knowledge of them, you're babbling on and demeaning anyone that points out that your arguments are based on hearsay and opinion, not to mention an incredibly rightist view of economics.Therumancer said:
I'm not trying to personally attack you hear, I'm just trying to say that maybe pretending to be well versed in foreign affairs based on out dated information from guild mates isn't a winning hand.
In my personal opinion, you sound rather intelligent, if very off base and if it weren't for the rest of your posts being quite reasonable, I'd assume you were trolling with your walls of text and nearly perfect filtered intake of criticism.
OT: It's about damn time we got some recognition for getting to where we are economically.
Umm... there is one aspect no one seems to be considering.
While the AUD and USD are nearly on par with each other, the earnings of them are not.
The US federal minimum wage (although states can enforce higher ones) is $7.25 an hour. Compare that to Australia where it is $15.96. That means that they make more than double what the Americans make. And going after MS, Apple and such isn't fair when everything in their market is more expensive than in the US.
Having said that, I can see the need for lower prices as people are going elsewhere to get their entertainment so it would be better for the economy to keep the consumers local. But it is not an issue of poverty and being over-charged as most would have you believe.
While the AUD and USD are nearly on par with each other, the earnings of them are not.
The US federal minimum wage (although states can enforce higher ones) is $7.25 an hour. Compare that to Australia where it is $15.96. That means that they make more than double what the Americans make. And going after MS, Apple and such isn't fair when everything in their market is more expensive than in the US.
Having said that, I can see the need for lower prices as people are going elsewhere to get their entertainment so it would be better for the economy to keep the consumers local. But it is not an issue of poverty and being over-charged as most would have you believe.