Outrageously expensive books

TechGromit

I signed up for "Network Forensics: Continuous Monitoring and Instrumentation" course at BlackHat this year. The course recommended you be familiar with Wireshark, which I have no knowledge / experience on. To get the most out of the class, I wanted to get a book to become proficient in Wireshark, and where do you go for books with good prices, Amazon of course. I ordered "Wireshark Network Analysis (Second Edition): The Official Wireshark Certified Network Analyst Study Guide" used for $75, which I thought was a little steep. Anyway when I received the book, they send me the wrong one, they sent me "Wireshark Certified Network Analyst: Official Exam Prep Guide", the book I wanted is over 900 pages, this book is only around 175 pages. Anyway when I was filing a return merchandise request, I see that Amazon is charging $668 for the book I have, used, and over 3 grand for the same book new. I was floored, maybe I should keep it and sell it on Ebay, buy the book I need and pocket the difference. My excitement was short lived, the same book is selling on Ebay for $60.

https://www.amazon.com/Wireshark-Certified-Network-Analyst-Official/dp/1893939987

This isn't the first time I've seen books that were priced outrageously on Amazon, apparently they used a formula to set the prices of the books and when there are only a few copies left in there inventory, it pushes the prices to unreasonable levels, despite often the same book is available for other sources at a much more reasonable price.

I guess I pays to shop around. If anyone is interested, I'll be happy to sell you my book for $500 before I return it, it's cheaper than Amazon.

Networking_Student

You need to report that to Amazon Seller services, that is a big deal to Amazon if they have a seller doing stuff like that.

alias454

What is there to report? Buy it or don't, but as a seller they should be free to set whatever price the market will bear Just my .02.

With that said it is a ridiculous price. Technical books in general are kind high priced but I also think that is because you won't ever find one on the best seller list

https://lcuportal2.com/wireshark101.html
https://www.udemy.com/wireshark-tutorial-guide-for-beginners/

TechGromit

Networking_Student wrote: »

You need to report that to Amazon Seller services, that is a big deal to Amazon if they have a seller doing stuff like that.

LOL, who do you think wanted to charge $3,000, there another example

https://www.amazon.com/Solving-Anorexia-Puzzle-Scientific-Approach/dp/3456818653/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1466227379&sr=1-3

51 million dollars for a book, only one available, order filled by Amazon itself.

The same exact book is available from another source for under $8.

https://www.amazon.com/Genetics-Continuity-Life-Student-Companion/dp/0534752780/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1466227379&sr=1-4

There is one for a trillion dollars, you would think they build in some kind of error checking to prevent these kind of run away prices.

wd40

You need to work on your book price research techniques

This is on Amazon new for 94.95
https://www.amazon.com/Wireshark-Network-Analysis-Second-Certified/dp/1893939944

This is on Amazon new for 39.95
https://www.amazon.com/Wireshark-Certified-Network-Analyst-Second/dp/1893939901/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1466231214&sr=1-6&keywords=Wireshark+Certified+Network+Analyst

DatabaseHead

@ Tech Gromit, agreed. They should have a algorithm that looks at the mean of all books under the ISBN and set a floor ceiling parameters to not allow it to go over a certain variance, in fact just set X^2. Sure a 91 dollar book can go up to 8281 but not 51 million. If they wanted they could get more restrictive.

636-555-3226

all i see are third-party sellers with the prices they can set. nothing wrong in that. doesn't mean anybody's going to buy them. im my experience i don't think i've ever seen amazon itself as a seller doing crazy stuff like that

ITSpectre

TechGromit wrote: »

LOL, who do you think wanted to charge $3,000, there another example

https://www.amazon.com/Solving-Anorexia-Puzzle-Scientific-Approach/dp/3456818653/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1466227379&sr=1-3

51 million dollars for a book, only one available, order filled by Amazon itself.

The same exact book is available from another source for under $8.

https://www.amazon.com/Genetics-Continuity-Life-Student-Companion/dp/0534752780/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1466227379&sr=1-4

There is one for a trillion dollars, you would think they build in some kind of error checking to prevent these kind of run away prices.

I bet they are foreign people looking to scam people..... anyone that would pay THAT much for any book needs to be exiled

Danielm7

I was an amazon seller for a long time. Many sellers use outside services to manage their inventory, they can do all sorts of things with automated repricing. Some sellers might run out of inventory and then instead of losing the listing they jack up the price to a crazy level, in the off chance someone actually paid that much I'm sure they could source it if they need to. There is nothing reportable about it. A lot of them use repricing so if there is a lowest price seller at 10,000 for a book someone else might set themselves to 9999.99 when they list. All kinds of goofy things really but a lot of people make a ton selling there.

TechGromit

Danielm7 wrote: »

There is nothing report-able about it.

I think it's looks bad for Amazon overall, here they are saying they are one of the lowest prices vendors on the internet, yet they allow a books to be priced between 1 million to 1 trillion dollars.

wd40 wrote: »

This is on Amazon new for 94.95
https://www.amazon.com/Wireshark-Network-Analysis-Second-Certified/dp/1893939944

This is the book I ordered used for $75, but that's not what i received. As for the other link, I just did a search for the book I had received, I wasn't shopping around for it, I didn't want it in the first place.

ITSpectre

I should try to sell a book on amazon for 1 million dollars.... If I sell it we all can go out for pizza on me

thomas_

If you didn't receive the book you ordered, return it and ask for a refund. If the seller doesn't cooperate report them to Amazon. Just because Amazon fulfills it doesn't mean Amazon sold it. A lot of sellers use Amazon's FBA service to fulfill their inventory. A lot of seller's use comingled inventory, so there's a chance that it wasn't even that seller's mistake as there have been cases of irreputable sellers intentionally sending end the wrong/counterfeit merchandise.