2.5 euros ~= 3.61 US dollars... That's... Well that's 3.61 times more than what iTunes charges, on average... You must have big brass ones to walk into a thread where folks are complaining about 15-20% markups and push something at a 361% markup while calling it reasonable or fair... I'm kind of speechless right now...

Don't forget about www.bitcoinworldmarket.com

We don't do Amazon, newegg etc... We have our own vendors and many of our prices are comparable to that which you can find on Amazon or the like. We also have a decent selection of items you can't get on amazon.

Cheers,

Jonathan

Hey, you might think the shop is mine, but it isn't. I just worked on it.

I don't set the prices, the record label does, and my first post was just to say that the prices aren't more expensive because they can be paid with bitcoin. Other users paying with ATM, bank transfer or paypal get the exact same prices. (note to self: tell the record label owner to give a 10% or 15% discount to people who pay with bitcoin)
As the complaint of the OP was about people pricing stuff in Bitcoin and pricing it more expensive for it, it was just a way to show that it's not always the case.
The reality is that we can't compare the prices on the music shop with itunes prices because we can't buy those tracks on itunes. If we could, then the comparison would be correct.

On a completely off-topic side note: People have no idea of the costs involved to maintain a legal digital downloads shop in Portugal, e.g.: just for having 30 seconds samples for the tracks the label needs to pay €100/month to the Portuguese RIAA equivalent, go figure, wether they sell or not. Add server costs, developers, etc, and it's a huge cost for an indie record label that has a tiny catalog and therefore doesn't sell much  And yet, the owner paid those $150 for the module to be built and opensourced, even if he wasn't expecting that much business from bitcoin users, just because he thinks Bitcoin is a wonderful thing than can change the world we all live in. And guess who introduced him to Bitcoin: me.

You all might think I'm an a-hole, but i really care for Bitcoin. And the only way to see it succeed is if small shops start accepting it, because you won't see the big ones doing it in the next years. I hope I'm wrong in this prediction, but I suspect I'm not.

Sorry about the long post and about anything else I might have said that offended any of you guys/girls.

Cheers!

+1

This sucks! I can't add anything to this post to make it better, nor supply an image. Good Job, psy.

I'd just like to point out that the excuse that stores have to inflate the prices if they take Bitcoin to handle exchange volatility is completely illegitimate.

Unless, that is, they refund some of your Bitcoins when the exchange rate goes up in between when you send the coins and when they sell them on an exchange.

That excuse of "well, in case it goes down" is just another way of saying, "We're going to guarantee that we make our profit -- and we're going to do short term speculation where we reap any and all rewards, but we'll force you to pay us extra in case we lose the bet."

π > e (T-Shirt idea)

I like your business model--linking all three sites. Is the bitsquirrel your design? I'm thinking about having Martin tool it on leather, is why I ask.

Because the prices will both rise and fall then over the longer term (e.g., week, month or quarter, at worst) these fluctuations will in most instances cancel each other out.

If this is something where there is absolutely no margin for fluctuations, the Mt. Gox redeemable code (voucher) gives the merchant the ability to trade on the proceeds instantaneously, though this requires the customer to use a Mt. Gox account rather than the bitcoin client. This voucher feature is currently available already but for the API they are looking for beta testers yet if I remember correctly.

Additionally, when volumes become large enough there will likely be easy and inexpensive methods for lessening this risks similar to how forex protections are available.

Don't forget http://CoinedBits.com. High quality unique product at an amazing price.

And check this out. It looks like arstechnica.com is one of my customers :-).

Here is todays article:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/08/symantec-spots-malware-that-uses-your-gpu-to-mine-bitcoins.ars

What about selling the food stuff that Walmart doesn't carry?