Yup. Judging from what else is available in the vaporizer market, it seems that 100-200 dollars is the sweet spot for this vape. Depending upon availability, increasing the price within that sweet spot can actually INCREASE demand, rather than temper it, as witnessed when it went up from 150 to 180. The danger is, however, that increasing the price beyond that sweet spot "could" cause the demand to come to a screeching halt.
There will always be a few that will be willing to pay "beyond" market prices on ebay so they can "be the first on their block", but that does not mean that a product will survive in the general marketplace at that inflated ebay price.
What Tom is doing is "just his way", but strictly from a long range marketing point of view (knowing full well that marketing is NOT what he is consciously doing here), what he is doing is exactly what he SHOULD be doing. Create a great product, create word of mouth desire for that product in a vapor enthusiast web site, price it in the "sweet spot", stay visible on that web site and respond to users and potential users in an effort to provide good customer service, keep the supply limited to keep demand high (knowing full well that a few showing up on ebay actually helps in increasing the desire for ownership).
But please understand. Tom DOES NOT think this way. He is not a marketeer. He is a builder of things. I'm not a builder of things. I am a marketeer, so I think this way. So ironically, Toms insistence of NOT doing what SEEMS to be good marketing sense, is really exactly what he SHOULD be doing, strictly from a long-term marketing prospective.
Now don't flame me guys. I am only coming from a marketing POV here. The vaporizer market is still in it's infancy and is rather small. When it grows, the above parameters may change, but unit that happens, personally, I think what Tom is doing here is exactly what he should be doing:
Create a quality product
Position it so that it fills a particular niche, and this case the niche is efficiency.
Provide excellent "after sale" support
Price product in the sweet spot
Limit supply to increase demand while maintaining the correct price point (knowing full well that Tom is not doing this with a marketing intent, ,but more from his personal life-style desires as well as his own personal ethics and beliefs)
Believe me guys, I totally understand your frustration in sitting in front of your computer hitting the refresh button, and some of you may even get so disgusted as to get anther vape, but until another vape shows up that can compete with the PD in terms of aesthetics, efficiency, simplicity, reliability, and user customer support, there will be more that continues to hit that refresh button than those that don't, so from an ex-marketing exec, my advice to Tom would be, "Don't change a thing". The limited availability just helps to create that aura of desirability (and knowing Tom, I can literally see his expression of disgust by my last statement here), but again, this is my POV, not Toms.