Heh.  I made it clear that I didn't have a problem 
with Taro's markups.  If they sell, they sell.

I also felt that the guy who was buying from the 
brick and mortar cel store in CA and then 
reselling on Ebay was within his rights.  He was 
making those cels available to a new audience 
(those that couldn't visit the shop personally).

So I'm pretty liberal, eh?  Then why did a 
reseller's website just get me steamed?  Because 
it was inflated and pointless.  What this dealer 
has done is buy cels from some popular internet 
sites, mark them up ridiculously, and then put 
them on HIS internet site.  He didn't make them 
available to a wider or different audience.  In 
fact, he probably limited their audience since his 
site can't be all that popular.

Near as I can tell, we're talking 500% markups.  
Nothing new.  Nothing unique.  Just the same stuff 
you've seen on all the popular sites, rehashed.

My favorite was a cel (mislabeled, no less) which 
I could swear was on AnimeChaos for about $18, and 
which is now priced at $95!

GOUGE, baby, GOUGE.

If you are going to add a service (say, importing 
cels) or provide "fresh blood" (cels nobody here 
in the USA has seen before), then by all means 
mark them up a bit for your contribution.  But if 
you are going to do is shuffle them around the 
'net and add another layer of middlemen....

feh!

JP