In Economics last night we learned about monopolies and oligopolies.

In case you didn't know, a Monopoly is the only supplier of a unique product with no close substitutes. An Oligopoly is a firm that produces a product for which only a few rival firms produce close substitutes.

Both tend to set the price for the market. They have enormous fixed costs which diminish as the quantity produced increases. Despite lower costs for producing more, they tend to produce less than the market demands. Monopolies (or Oligopolies) also charge more than it really costs for the products or sevices delivered.

Monopolies and Oligopolies tend to underdeliver and over charge unless they have any enticements to do otherwise. An effective impetus to produce more is the practice of charging different buyers different prices for essentially the same good (or service).

Thus, if a game console were released, unlike any other, a Monopoly would be formed by the provider of said console; especially if demand were higher than the amount of product delivered. If the provider could sell for different prices, it might be enticed to make more, possibly nearing (but probably not meeting) market demand.