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Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

mobeigi.com

101–110 of 124 posts

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#101

I’ve done the same thing for discovering cheaper billing profile on many services, e.g. Netflix or whatnot. Never thought to document it. Finding it is a bit easy, processing the payment sometimes is geo locked by an account in that region (google/android) or having a form of payment in that country. Japan usually is paypay or a credit card with the BIN issued in Japan. There are many local payment providers though t…

You can add foreign CCs to Alipay/WeChat, but you can't use it to add funds. Foreign CCs are also subject to a bunch of fees (network + card issuer + fx that seem to go up to 5%). There's no free lunch.

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#102
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>nor is there any good reason to just assume that favouring short-term gains will favour the current shareholders more The reason is that it's a situation that's bound to happen. If I plan to be invested in a company for a specific length of time (for whatever reason) any decisions that benefit the company beyond that term do not benefit me. If those decisions actually harm the company in the short term then they wor…

Why would the future value of the company not benefit you? Do your shares get stolen or cease to exist? I assumed you were to sell them.

The market need not agree with the company's management that the direction it's going will ultimately be beneficial.

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#103

I’ve done the same thing for discovering cheaper billing profile on many services, e.g. Netflix or whatnot. Never thought to document it. Finding it is a bit easy, processing the payment sometimes is geo locked by an account in that region (google/android) or having a form of payment in that country. Japan usually is paypay or a credit card with the BIN issued in Japan. There are many local payment providers though t…

You can add foreign CCs to Alipay/WeChat, but you can't use it to add funds. Foreign CCs are also subject to a bunch of fees (network + card issuer + fx that seem to go up to 5%). There's no free lunch.

Many cards in the US do not charge any foreign transaction fees, and Alipay/WeChat waive their fees on small ticket items as well.

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#104
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never actually seen them criticized here but I'll bite since I've worked for one. Worker owned companies are just a different shade of typical corporate politics. I worked for North America's largest sewer inspection and cleaning company. The company did about equal volumes of each type of work but since inspection is more technology based there were far more cleaners than there were inspectors and analysts. I'd…

There are different ways to structure worker cooperatives and decision making. Have you seen the consent-based framework sociocracy uses (rather than majority voting or consensus)?

It's hard to say without turning back time that this would've changed things. I could see a seasoned cleaner arguing that the diff of x and y dividends would be impactful to their lives and that I could be pressured to build a less efficient, decentralized system that compliments the existing decentralized system because when I signed up inefficiency was already built in.

Having voting power didn't actually change my position as someone making a proposal. It actually made it worse because now instead of convincing one slightly less informed king I'm trying to convince a room full of even lesser informed peasantry. It'd be like if the cleaners tried to convince me to buy the new line of vac truck with technology advancements that can clean a complex sewer in ten minutes instead of 30. Reflexively, having never dropped down in waders into a sewer I'd say, "Well, what's 20 more minutes of contractual time?"

That's ultimately the social mechanics that were at play: "Okay nerd, why do you need better efficiency and audit ability? This industry has gotten by just fine filing physical hard drives into physical filing systems for a long time." Without being required to empathize with the problem, and without being necessitated to have experienced decision making it's like democracy with pure bureaucracy and no subject matter experts.

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#105

They priced me out of a subscription. £15 a month in the UK for an online chess game is crazy. I've paid for 3 months but this is my last. I'm only interested in Game review, but there are about 50 other sub-categories on their site that i don't use. Only their top tier of membership provides game review and to be honest it's not even that good. The game review is about the top 'computer' move, not what a human shoul…

Chess.com's game review is rubbish. Make an account on Lichess and play there instead. Lichess has engine analysis too and it's completely free.

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#106
post #9
post #6

Chess.com is a scam anyway. Rather than comparing the price of Norwegian Chess.cok to Nigerian Chess.con you should be comparing to lichess.org. They have a better app and plenty of people to play with, without any paywalling or marketing or rent-seeking.

> Chess.com is a scam anyway Is it? How so? Just because you like an alternative better doesn't make it a scam. Sure they are turning a profit. But when you pay, you get more features. You don't need to pay if you don't want those features or want them somewhere else. And they use some money to sponsor events. Titled Tuesday is a staple in the worldwide chess community and most top players play there. Not really yo m…

Loads of top players play on lichess too, including Carlsen. Titled Tuesday is not a staple in the worldwide chess community. The world championships (classical, blitz and rapid) are.

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#107
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There would be similar pushback if Steam started selling games for cheaper in Greenville, Alabama vs New York City. Plenty of regions in the USA have way worse economic disparity than the two you have highlighted. The point of being a single economic/political bloc is to be able to negotiate collectively and work towards a balance.

Eh you'd be surprised. GDP per capita in Bulgaria in 2024 was just $17,412 compared to $57,723 in Sweden (331% increase) while GDP per capita in Alabama was $61,846 compared to $116,883 in New York (189% increase). America's a lot more socioeconomically homogeneous compared to the EU due to Federal spending and a more integrated economy.

>America's a lot more socioeconomically homogeneous compared to the EU

Well also the fact that America is a single country with a shared history.

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#108
post #29

Steam used to have (until 2016) a two tier regonal pricing in the EU (EU1 and EU2) but they had to stop it because it was discrimination that people in Sweden paid more for a game than people in Bulgaria. Now everyone in the EU pays the same as people in Sweden. And of course games haven't become cheaper either

No, it’s because resellers would buy 50,000 Latvian keys and then sell them to people from rich countries.

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#109
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are different ways to structure worker cooperatives and decision making. Have you seen the consent-based framework sociocracy uses (rather than majority voting or consensus)?

It's hard to say without turning back time that this would've changed things. I could see a seasoned cleaner arguing that the diff of x and y dividends would be impactful to their lives and that I could be pressured to build a less efficient, decentralized system that compliments the existing decentralized system because when I signed up inefficiency was already built in. Having voting power didn't actually change my…

https://www.sociocracyforall.org/consent-decision-making/

Re: Chess.com regional pricing: A case study

#110
post #4

It seems like the US has really cheap pricing compared to Western Europe, especially when you consider the poorer countries such as Portugal, Italy, Spain etc. I wonder if they can get away charging higher prices in these countries because chess is more popular there.

Isn't it the case that US prices are without sales tax, whereas all EU/UK prices are inclusive of tax by law?

Yes as the sales tax rules vary from state to state. The interesting thing is historically I think sales tax was only for physical goods if you download the software there is no sales tax but if you get a physical CD then its taxed. Some states have modified the laws but many like California still don't tax downloaded software.
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