This report "Tracking the mystery of lost PS3" in a TV news show was aired today in Japan.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tS24_gj2DFg
Yesterday they visited a young Japanese guy who bought a PS3 for the 1/4 of his monthly salary. Asked about the merit of PS3, he replies it's full HD. But the panning camera shows he only has a CRT TV and can't enjoy the full HD. The reporter laughs. The narrator says it requires investment in equipments to fully enjoy PS3.
It flashes back to the launch day and shows the cashier. Then back to today's Akihabara, Tokyo, no store has a stock of PS3. The launch day again, and this time the camera shows a group overlooking the shop from a bit distant place. They have 2 vans full of PS3. They even have a truck. Even today, everytime a store in Akihabara receives PS3 a buyout group gets most of them. The reporter meets a Chinese student who was hired by the group for 16,000 yen (137$) to get in the line on the PS3 launch day. They let him watch the video of the PS3 line on the launch day and he points out Chinese people in the line. Apparently the group hired 1,500 people for the launch day. The student says according to the head of the group they managed to get over 1200 units out of 1500 units sold at Yodobashi Camera on the launch day. The head of the group is Chinese. They export them to China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. Many PS3 are on a Chinese auction web site and one of them is priced at 8800 yuan (130,000 yen = 1117$).
They flew to Hong Kong to visit the reseller. They infiltrated their office full of cardboard boxes in which they have PS3. A PS3 sold in Japan has "J1" in its sticker and the PS3 found in Hong Kong has it. Apparently the PS3 is very popular in China and they bring 50 units every day from Japan to China via Hong Kong.
Then they invited those from India, Brasil, the UK, and Australia to let them search auction websites in their countries for PS3. They all have PS3 on sale from $1200-2400.
A day before yesterday, they visited the Sapanlek electronic store arcade in Thailand, Bangkok. They have a stock of PS3 resold from Japan. They visit a rich Thai businessman (29 years old) who has a PS3. He bought a large HDTV just for PS3 and can fully enjoy it actually unlike the Japanese guy who appeared in the beginning. Asked about the difficulty to find a PS3 in Japan, he says "oh really? It's lucky we can buy it whenever we like in Thailand." But actually he paid 4 times more than the average monthly salary in Thailand for a PS3.
Again a day before yesterday, in Hiroshima city in Japan, far from Tokyo, there was a store that would receive PS3. It took an hour to go sold-out. One of the buyers was a grandmother who was there by chance. She bought it for her grandchildren. Back at home, they and their friends got delighted.
