Alas, hardware geeks in Melbourne, swapmeets are no more. The associated Computer Trader magazine has also gone west, along with its web site, which briefly said:
Max and Dorothea have been receiving a significant amount of harassment by lawyers acting in relation to the sale of counterfeit goods at the swapmeets and by Computer Trader. They have found the allegations and threats of legal action against them to be very stressful and detrimental to their health and general well being. The allegations are untrue and the threats are without foundation.
Max and Dorothea have always been at pains to operate their businesses within the law and with integrity and transparency. They thank their staff and customers for their support over the past sixteen years.
(The site itself is gone already, but is currently available in the Google cache.)
With heightened competition from online retailers and aggregator sites like StaticIce, it’s not hard to see how this kind of game might not be as profitable as it once was. Even obscure/old equipment that once might have been found at swapmeets is probably more easily found on eBay these days. Legal issues aside, maybe it’s time was over.
(Thanks to MGM for the tipoff.)
Time up? The 5 or so swap meets I’ve attended in about the last year have been more or less packed. The exception was the one I went to at the Moorabbin Town hall, which by comparison to the Collingwood, Camberwell and Malvern ones I attended was dead. Where else do you get to look at a whole heap of stuff like that, not all of it specifically computer related (LED torches, mobile phones and batteries etc). Probably the best part was that most of the vendors were willing haggle over the price, something you can’t really do with online retailers or on eBay. Sad news indeed.
With regard to the counterfeit software, I was under the impression that these stalls were selling freely downloadable trial versions (not strictly legal either) that expire after a month or something. Twenty dollars for Photoshop was just too good to be true, there had to be a catch. The fact that there were stalls that chipped gaming consoles on the spot for people while they wait was also probably a bit of a grey area.
Sad to see yet more of these swap meets close. I’ve been quiet envious you still had yours in Melbourne. The regular one in Western Australia
closed it’s doors about 3 years ago pretty much for teh same reasons. Very disappionting as I’d only discovered it about 6 months before.
And they’re back!
http://www.technologymarkets.com.au/