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Comment by mrbad101 | Hacker News Reader

I come from the call center / telemarketing business (don't worry, we aren't as evil as most ), and I can tell you first hand that "pennies per person" couldn't be further from the truth.

Names and numbers on their own are incredibly valuable.

Names and numbers that you know exactly the demographic they come from, are gold mines.

I can tell you that some run of the mill name and number can easily be worth $1.

Gauging the fact that he assumes their target audience is rich (which I doubt this is the case), we at least know it is a very specific type of people. This is as close to texas tea as it gets for telemarketers.

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Are you talking about list rentals? Sorry, but I used to work in this industry too and you are way off.

First, you know hardly anything about these people. At best you have a guess about their income. You don't know age or occupation or education level. (Not to mention a large number of the names are probably bogus -- I would certainly fill out bogus data.) Realistically, you'd have to overlay it with data from other sources to make it usable to anyone besides, perhaps, other companies selling overpriced puzzles.

I can get much complete and valuable demographics for much less than $1 each. (Female C-Level executives in the marketing industry? $200 per thousand).

Like I said, it's not a conspiracy. It's just a junky puzzle.

No, I'm not talking about list rentals.

30,000 names at $1 per is a pretty poor business model.

I go with the "crappy puzzle from a clueless company" explanation.

I said, a run of the mill name and number could net you a dollar.

These names/numbers aren't. Granted lots of people use bogus names and numbers, but the vast majority aren't going to that purchase an item of this value.

Yes, before you say it, I realize that nobody here does, and nobody you know does, and blah blah blah.

In the real world, most people do. I wouldn't be in business if they didn't.

I'm going to go with a crappy response, from a clueless person.

That assumes the list only ever is sold (or licensed) once.

+ $200 a puzzle + other products. Not too shabby for a potentially 1-2 man operation.

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