Scarcity as Value: Tuesday Open Thread

So in addition to my other avocations (raconteur, gentleman thief, hobbyist blacksmith, Holy Man for Hire) I am also the World’s Cheapest Watch Snob. I really enjoy mechanical clocks and watches- the amazing precision of ninety pieces (or more) meshing together in harmony is mesmerizing. These devices were the cutting edge of precision technological development for hundreds of years. Here is the best interactive explanation I’ve ever seen.  And yet now they are a very intentional step back from modernity, a declaration that some things are more important than being exactly On Time.

Anyway.

One of the biggest debates in the community right now (other than the precise split of Techbros vs. Money Launderers buying $100k+ watches) is over manufacturers’ increasing use of “Limited Editions” to drive sales. Upon a time, limited editions were one-offs using unusual complications or materials that were hard to work with. Now, every damned thing is a limited edition, including basic dial colors like “blue” and “green”- they could easily produce more, but they won’t.

The psychology is multifaceted but effective. It puts a time pressure on a buying decision. It taps into the Fear of Missing Out. It appeals to the Modern Consumerist Ideology that uses choice of material goods to express uniqueness and personality- in a mass production culture, a rare good marks you as Special.

But it also hurts consumers as a whole. I would like to buy that blue watch Not because it is rare but because I really like the watch and really like that blue. But unless I pony up roughly double the actual price of the watch, I will never see it.

I bring this up because the Ultimate Artificial Scarcity is back in the news: Wu Tang’s Once Upon a Time in Shaolin is heading for Tasmania.  Characterized as “a 400-year-old Renaissance-style approach to music, offering it as a commissioned commodity” the album is (allegedly) the only copy of 31 tracks in existence. As part of the sale conditions, the owner cannot release the tracks for 88 years. It was originally bought by Noted PharmaBro Fuckhead Martin Shkreli for a couple million dollars, and then seized by the government during the Find Out portion of Shkreli’s career. Half-hour samples of the album will be played to ‘small listening parties’ at the Mona Museum.

Now listen: there is beauty in the unique. The appreciation of the transitory nature of experience. To know that there is only one of something in the whole world.

But that view assumes you are the person experiencing the moment. That you are the one who is privileged to see, hear or do whatever special thing is at issue. For everyone not so privileged, there is deprivation and longing, if they are even aware of its existence. How many masterpieces are shut away in some asshole’s private art collection, never to be seen by the public? Culture starves when access is too limited. Our entire Western concepts of patent and copyright are based on the idea that it is a social good for innovation and inspiration to be widely available, and so we accord special (limited) protections to encourage creators to share.

All respect to RZA and Wu Tang, but this was a shitty idea and I’m glad it hasn’t caught on. Value that depends mostly on scarcity is no value at all.

NFL NEWS

-Jack Shit. The Bears vaunted new-look offense shat the bed in OTAs, but it’s OTAs for fuck sake.

-Maybe the rookie’s alright

-LATE ADDITION: Nico Collins got paaaaaaid. The Texans decided one hot year with the new QB was enough to merit 3 more years and $72ish million, $52 million guaranteed. Good on him.