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Which one will people be going for this year?

The 360 has the advantage of already being on the market and is doing well.  However, the hype around the PS3’s graphics and the Wii’s new joystick is causing quite a stir.

I myself have little brand loyalty and have switched between Sony, Nintendo and Sega at the blink of an eye - not on purpose, just because i liked a particular game that was available on a console at the time.

One thing i hate about big product launches is the way honest people get scammed due to demand always overpowering the supply.  Why can’t they ship out enough of these boxes to allow everyone to get one at the same time?  Is it really because they can’t make them fast enough or is it because they want to build up their customers into a frenzy………hmm, i know which one I’m going for.

But yeah, rip offs.  Ebay has a tough job.  But in recent years its been a classic place for the internet predators to lurk selling dodgy gear to innocent people not sure as to what they’re buying.  Not only does it give an outlet for people who buy numerous machines purely to sell them on for a 3,4,5 times profit but there’s also the scams.  I’ve heard reports of people just buying the box of an Xbox, yes just THE BOX, no machine was  inside.  Another example, which seems to have gone down in internet folk law is a guy who sold a cardboard box with a drawn on ‘X’ for $600 - it is fairly funny, unless you’re the one $600 down wondering where the power lead is for the brown box that just arrived.

Ebay can’t really be blamed directly for these things, with an estimated 7 million new listings per day it’s a thankless job sifting through trying to find the fake items. And anyway, why can’t you put a box with an ‘X’ marked on it and try and make some cash?  The line between novelty and deception can often become blurred in these situations.

So thank goodness Ebay has decided to do something proactive for the PS3 and Wii sales.  Only one of each console can be listed per seller at a time prior to the system launch dates.  The seller must only accept PayPal payments and have a minimum of 50 feedback and a rating of 98% or higher to qualify for PayPal Buyer Protection. The pre-sale can only be in Auction format, no Buy It Now listings will be accepted.  The listing must include a clear photo of the pre-order receipt in the description of your auction.

These constraints wil hopefully cut out most of the rip off merchants and allow keen players to get their consoles, still at an inflated price, but atleast they’ll get what they pay for.

So which one to get?  To be honest i think all 3 offer a great service with the Xbox 360 having the online game play, the PS3 stunning graphics and the Wii with its new controller.  The only real (and fair) option would be to have all 3, expensive but then the only way to not miss out.  My personal favourite is the PS3 as i like the games and graphics that come with them, but the sway is less than 5% and i’ll no doubt change my mind numerous times.

I think the main thing to remember is PATIENCE - the PS3 isn’t going to make christmas now anyway so why rush to pay more for a product that will be £50 cheaper in a month or so’s time?  Even if you do want a console on the first day of release and haven’t managed to reserve one, make sure if you do find a seller - you find out who they are (really who they are), what they’re selling (really what they’re selling), and other peoples feedback on the seller (really what they’re saying). 

To give a real life example of scams that really make me lose faith in humanity is this:

I took part in a Breast Cancer awareness day today, please go to http://www.thebreastcancersite.com/ and click the ‘Fund Free Manograms’ Button to raise a few pence for them.  We’ve had a great day with people dressed in pink, pink cakes, pink flowers, balloons the works.  Only problem is when the above link was sent around work the link was mistakenly typed with a .co.uk on the end (I’m not posting the whole link as i dont want any more hits for that site).  The .co.uk site is a fake Cancer Research site that is full of sponsored links setup purely to make the owner money.  Who does this?  I’m all up for a bit of creative thinking but stealing traffic from a Cancer site, thats so far past the line you’ve nearly gone full circle.  Luckily the mistake was quickly spotted and a corrected email closely followed the previous one but no doubt the site had a few hundred hits that raised them a few pounds.

Unfortunaltely buying up domain names purely to put adverts on has been around ever since the interent was born.  Many people have become multi milloinaires off doing exactly that - but charity sites?  Have SOME morales at least - you don’t work or contribute anything meaningful to the world so its the least you can do - no really it is - seriously.

Ok, rant over =).

Oh yeah, a PS3 is my tip, but then i like the Wii controller, and the 360 Live play……………..or should i just stick to poker…………?

Talking of poker I will have a BIG update coming soon regarding Poker Sharks, Tournaments are nearly done and it’s not far off going live.  Its been a long wait but once this poker room is done the site will be up Season after Season with minimal disruption for ever more.