10 years ago today, The Onion announced the release of the New Device.

10 years ago today, The Onion announced the release of the New Device. The new device was much more technologically advanced than the old device, and many consumers lined up to buy it. The new device was also available in blue. Eventually, the new device was replaced by the newer device, which was itself ultimately replaced by the next latest device.

The only part of this article which doesn’t sound like it could be written today is the price: the new device launched with a price of $395. While there are many new devices released today for less than that, the kind of devices that people buy just so they can show off that they own the device (as mentioned in the article) tend to be more expensive.

I mean, what's the point of having the newest device when people can't see how much money you can afford to spend on something as frivolous as device? It's not like the new device does really provide any true benefits over the old device.

<flaunts very old device in hipster fashion>
It's from a cooler time.

Across this new device!

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Originally Posted by Yora

I mean, what's the point of having the newest device when people can't see how much money you can afford to spend on something as frivolous as device? It's not like the new device does really provide any true benefits over the old device.

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There's a sketch from I think College Humor, along those lines. "The new Rose Gold Apple Watch. Just like any other smart watch, but this one costs 10'000$ and everyone looking at it will know you paid 10'000$ for something you don't need."

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Originally Posted by Eldan

There's a sketch from I think College Humor, along those lines. "The new Rose Gold Apple Watch. Just like any other smart watch, but this one costs 10'000$ and everyone looking at it will know you paid 10'000$ for something you don't need."

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Which sums up exactly why overpriced flashy thingmabobs sell so well. It is pretty surreal that some brands can be sold for really high prices mostly because everyone knows they are expensive in the first place. Works for everything from candy and shoes to cars. It can also happen that a lower price would deter potential clients - we can be crazy that way.

It's not just electronics. Gadgets at least do something and have a somewhat difficult production process. The only value of diamonds comes from their price tag. It's lumps of carbon which are not particularly rare or expensive to create artifically for industrial use. Being sold for high prices is their only selling point.

Eh, I'm waiting for the new article on this to come out.

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Originally Posted by Yora

It's not just electronics. Gadgets at least do something and have a somewhat difficult production process. The only value of diamonds comes from their price tag. It's lumps of carbon which are not particularly rare or expensive to create artifically for industrial use. Being sold for high prices is their only selling point.

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That's slightly disingenuous to say vis a vis diamonds. They may be lumps of carbon, but they are rare and also expensive to find (the gem quality ones). You can indeed create industrial diamonds but they are mostly in fact lumps of coal more than what we think of as "diamonds". It is still rather difficult to make larger sized gemquality synthetic diamonds.

The one thing that is true is that rarity is partly* artificial, in that powerful interests monopolize the market to make sure there's less in it than might oterwise be the case. Also the value is indeed somewhat artificial, if people didn't make a big deal about a real gemstone quality diamond it wouldn't have much more use than most similar looking less valuable minerals ("gemstones"). And that market is largely, if not entirely manufactured by the natural diamond industry.


*I say partly because large gemquality stones are not common, there's a reason the really really large specimens are "celebrated", Koh-i-noor, Star of Africa etc etc

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Originally Posted by Radar

Which sums up exactly why overpriced flashy thingmabobs sell so well. It is pretty surreal that some brands can be sold for really high prices mostly because everyone knows they are expensive in the first place. Works for everything from candy and shoes to cars. It can also happen that a lower price would deter potential clients - we can be crazy that way.

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The technical term in the economic literature appears to be "Veblen goods".

Economics is the study of the production and the distribution of scarce resources.