Gold Mercury Dime 2016, Disappointment Courtesy of US Mint?

Wow and they went so fast. I feel better now but don't like the fact that they are able to do that. We should do the same and make some of that money.

 

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You would be free to do that.

 

I learned my lesson, we will get the next 2.

 

I agree that most people have a fair shot of getting the coins when the release date & time is known. I ended up getting my order in with less glitches than previously but I think that is something the Mint needs to work on. Can't they temporarily get, enough servers, to manage a higher than normal demand?

I mean they have data from previously launches where the website failed to keep up with orders. So they have the information to guide them in terms of what kind of server capacity they need. To me that is the main issue for these kind of releases. I ended up being shut out on a previous high demand item even though I was logged into my account several minutes before the item went on sale. So there is a lot of work to be done on that end

 

Yes you are right but don't forget that these offerings are for the entire world and I would think that the extreme overload of everyone and their mother wanting their share including all the hoarders for the dealers and with the unusually low mintages on these ; I really don't think that there could be a computer that smart to keep up with it. Don't forget there are multiple loads coming in all at once and to top all that, there are people that get through but take there time because they don't know what they are doing. I guess you have to be lucky, that is the main thing.

 

Is this really a "Free Market", or manipulation designed to enrich a few big businesses that control the mint? Yeah, the average guy may get lucky and make a few bucks, but the real money is made by a few big guys, who, after the initial bubble, destroy the secondary market in the short run, by flooding the market. A free market would sell them to demand.

 

Finding a way to temporarily increase bandwidth isn't really a viable solution for a 1-2 hour period. Keep in mind that Apple, a huge tech company with massive data centers and back-end resources, still has server melt downs on product launch days. Just try to order a new iPhone at midnight on day one of pre-orders, or try to download the latest major iOS update the morning its released...

Also, 125k is a lot compared to other non-bullion gold coin products from the Mint. They were probably not expecting to have most all of them disappear in less than an hour.

In the end, it doesn't really matter. If there were no connectivity issues and everyone ordered right away, the thing would have been gone in a couple minutes. This too would have resulted in upset people not being able to get their coins because their clock was 3 minutes off... When the ordering system is slow, its slow for everyone. Some people get lucky and click just at the right moment. Some people aren't so lucky.

The only surefire way to make sure everyone that wants one gets one, is to make as many as people are willing to buy.

 

I agree, we cannot compete with them. They can even sell them at a lower cost because they have so many of them and they ruin it for everybody.

 

Yeah, they used to say, "You're screwed coming & going". In better times they just screwed you once, coming or going. When you don't have a chance is when they do it to you both ways.

The anything but "Free Market" today has become very good at creating bubbles that benefit the manipulators.

 

The Apple comparison isn't quite the same. I've bought iPhones so I know. With Apple we're talking about millions or tens of millions. 125k may not be even 1% of the orders Apple takes in on launch day. And just because it's only a limited window doesn't mean they shouldn't try. Your ability to place an order shouldn't be based on a lucky click

 

This is becoming downright amusing.

 

I doubt more than 2-3% of these if that are being shipped internationally directly from the mint. Half the world it is the middle of the night for a 12pm launch time, and unless you are paying in Euros or Pounds the price is significantly higher for currency conversion. You can eliminate most of the world just from cost, lack of internet ect. All of that is assuming they had any interest to begin with.

Even if we say the interest was there and they tried, Amazon works just fine during the holidays and they do more volume in short spurts then than the mint does all year. There are systems perfectly capable of handling the volume of people the mint gets even with products like these. The mint just has an inferior system and no motivation to put a lot of resources in it. They got their sales, it doesn't matter to them who they ship them too as long as they sold.

 

I wasn't on board for this issue, so I have absolutely no experience to share, regarding it but.............I was on board for the Truman Coin & Chronicles set which sold out in what? Ten minutes? I got two. I was logged on prior to the 12PM shotgun start. Ya want a popular item? Log on ahead of time and 'refresh, refresh, refresh'..........And enough with the blasted whining. It's getting 'old' real fast.

 

I'm one of the ones who tried to order but could not get in before they ran out. so I will say again:
Mintage limit 125,000 - limit 10 per buyer = 12,500 buyers
figure big buyers bought 10 at home address, 10 at business address that makes it 6,250 buyers
Now figure that several big buyers leveraged others to buy for them and lined up say 10 buyers, that brings it down to only 1,250 buyers
that just stinks.
I cant really blame the big guys, they are just trying to make a buck, so really, I blame the Mint. A limit of 2 per house and a larger number minted would ease this problem. Even the 1916-D had 264,000 minted, at least mint that many for a little historical significance. And limit 2 per house with checks on name, address, and method of payment for duplication.
well sour grapes, I'll get over it. but yes, a little disappointed. and no I will NOT be buying one at premium from one of the big buyers. Plenty of other coins to enjoy.

 

For what it's worth, I missed out to on this coin but I just bought one from this seller on ebay for $255 with $5 in ebucks. $250 not bad



http://www.ebay.com/itm/141972672811?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

 

looks like $289 is the price
no thanks

 

This isn't like some big show coming to town where you hire in a bunch of extra manpower for the night. You either have the bandwidth and computing capacity, or you don't, and if you only need that capacity once or twice a year there is absolutely no business reason to maintain (it ain't cheap) that capacity the other 363 days.

Anyway, the proof is in the pudding - they managed to sell out rather quickly. They obviously had enough capacity to do the job. That's what I find so amusing - everybody carping about not getting their orders, failing to avail themselves of fat profits on the secondary market....the Mint managed exactly what they'd planned. They don't know who bought the coins.

And the big guys only make the big bucks if you little guys are willing to pay them.

I will say, though, I agree with softmentor that a "2 per household" limit would have prevented much of the angst. I almost have to wonder if they were factoring the limitations of their system into the purchase limit, knowing it was going to be a quick sellout.

 

I offered $255 and they accepted the offer. Still not as good as $210 from the mint

 

You don't just call up your service provider and ask for more capacity for the afternoon on a given day. The Mint pays for a system that can manage a given number of connections and transaction at a given time. They aren't going to pay to have the system expanded for a few hours a year. The work involved to take a system that handles 1,000's of orders per week, and make it handle 1,000's per minute would be extreme. It would be cost prohibitive to set up the system, and test it, just to have it for a few hours.

What about Ticketmaster, or other ticket outlets? Their systems are crippled on a regular basis for high demand events. People that can’t get in are left to buy on the secondary market if they want tickets. This isn't some isolated problem that only the Mint deals with.

Even if online ordering systems were to work flawlessly, sellouts would be measured in second, not minutes. How would we fix the problem of people not having available internet fast enough to compete with those with Google Fiber, or how would we help the people that can’t click and type as fast as other people? At what point do we start treating online product sales as high frequency trading?

 

Another "coin of the century" just like the RP dime? ...