I don't fully understand this narrative that is going around about scalpers and the controller. So many people online are claiming it was only scalpers who were able to purchase one. I am also not a scalper (as someone else said), and was able to purchase one. We don't know how many they actually had in stock in total but let's say it's around 30K, from what I have searched on eBay and other reselling sites it would only seem like less than 1% of the stock is being sold by resellers/scalpers. I think it was just a high demand product. I know scalpers are a problem in much of the entertainment industry right now, but it's also becoming a scape goat for anything you just weren't able to buy yourself. It's quite annoying and getting old fast.

I really wonder how many scalpers there were. I got one. I am not a scalper. Maybe it was just high demand for limited stock.

I don't really understand this argument. Is your position that if scalpers didn't exist you'd have a better chance of getting this product?

Scalpers have no effect on the supply of a product, they only affect the demand of the product and specifically they reduce the demand for the product by increasing the price.

I got 2. 1 for me and 1 for my brother. I sat with the page loaded and waiting. It opened a few minutes early and I was able to still order a 2nd about 5 minutes into sale

I'm hoping that the controller sale was a test/recon run for preventing scalping for the Frame/Machine.

I think valve typically has pretty good scalper protection. Was that not the case this time?

I have one and didn't have any issues buying, nor heard anyone have any issues buying in the past... In fact, the Steam Controller was considered a flop.