A group of Democrats leads the “Stop the Grinch Bots Act“, A proposal with an incredibly silly name that aims to prevent (or at least limit) the use of bots to tap inventory at online retailers. Something many of you trying to get PS5s and new graphics cards are struggling with powerful in the past 18 months.
The MP Paul Tonko, Senator Richard Blumenthal, the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer and Senator Ben Ray Luján announced on the 29th they are selling them to their parents at higher prices. “
This is not the first time Democratic lawmakers have tried this; how PC Mag Clues, this is actually a reintroduction of a bill that went nowhere in 2019, but there is hope that the sharp rise in bots and scalping in the months since the pandemic began will result in greater support this time around.
The Stopping Grinch Bots Act is supported by groups like Consumer Reports, Consumer Federation of America, and the National Consumer League. Its connection with Christmas is strange, as is the law’s focus on families and children. Schumer says: “The average Christmas buyer can’t keep up with the speed of light of the all-too-common Grinch bot and is then held up by scalpers for ransom.” and third party vendors when you’re trying to buy Christmas gifts. “
This is a year-round problem that affects everyone! From PlayStations to Jordans to Nvidia cards and cinema tickets. Pinning the whole thing on the holidays may be an attempt to appeal to the legislature’s sensitivity, but it also does the scale of the problem a disservice.
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In terms of how the Stopping Grinch Bots Act actually works, it would be based on the Better Online Ticket Sales Act of 2016, which cracks down on bots and resale practices for things like concerts and sporting events, and “uses the mechanism of the BOTS.” Take action on e-commerce websites to ban bots that circumvent security measures on online retail sites. “
It is much easier said than done. Live events that require human presence are one thing; a completely different matter is the number of transactions in the resale market that are delivered straight to the door. We have already seen in markets like sneakers that manufacturers and retailers do not care who buys their goods as long as they do someone and once the product is out it is not your problem what happens to it.
Any attempt to counter this would require the collaboration of countless US retailers to make changes to their websites and sales policies that they believe they have little incentive to implement. And besides, while retailers can help alleviate the problem, they can’t solve it because the problem here is a supply vs. Demand problem, not retail enforcement problem. As long as Nike wants to make fewer dunks than people can buy, or Sony struggles to get enough chips for PS5s, there will be a shortage, and wherever there is a shortage there will be a resale market regardless of the intentions of stores and politicians .
But yes, to end this with less disappointment, they can at least try something, and any changes retailers end up making will be an improvement on how things are now.
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