It's because people add that price to the value of their adopt whether or not they even want the adopt anymore, I personally could never understand paying 100$ for a colored in base, that just screams absurd to me but people do crazy things with their money all the time, so in that sense the person with the 100$ adopt will only want something of equal value that they also enjoy.

I mean, what's to stop the person with the 10$ dog from just selling your adopt for 100$ to buy 10 more dogs or whatever else?

Nothing stops them, but I don't see how that matters?
Like you didn't want the cat, but you wanted that dog. You traded it away, so what if they sell the cat and get 10 more dogs, if that's what they want to do, go for it. 'v'
(People kinda do this anyway. Even if they don't get 10 more dogs, I've seen people get an adopt from someone, then give that adopt away for several other adopts from someone who RLY RLY WANTS that adopt.)

I feel the same way, and I think it's more helpful when people say "I'd like to trade this cat for a dog" than "I'd like to trade this $100 adopt for another $100 adopt" because if someone offers a dog that you don't think is worth giving your cat away for then you can always just say no? Trying to trade for a similar price just scares people off who might have really cool adopts they want to trade that are below your price range.

Exactly, to the 'no' thing.
I don't understand trading for money, you trade for something you want. But I've never bought an adopt for a lot of money, so perhaps that's why I don't understand. I guess in the event one needs money, they could always sell the adopt in a bind? But if they traded that away for a 2 dollar adopt, then they won't be getting much needed money? idk

Well you already know most of my thoughts on this subject, BUT I was thinking the other day, adopts tend to be viewed as and considered more desirable when they are worth more money (or rather, 'worth' is a subjective term here when it comes to digital products, perhaps more accurately the price they've been bought at) I have even caught myself doing this, I tend to be more attracted to adopts that I think were made by a certain artist or an artist who's a friend or an artist who's auctions goes high.
However, the artists do ridiculously well with adopts don't do so just because of luck. People are willing to pay higher prices for certain designs because the designer is genuinely good at what they do, and their success is the fruit of a long grueling process of practicing, learning, designing, building a fan base, finding out what works, and striving to improve. So the price a person is willing to pay corresponds to the 'worth' or the quality of that design.

It also depends on how much the person wants the design (and what money they have to spend) which will drive up the price. And that goes right back into the cycle of people want more expensive adopts, so they're willing to pay more money, and the more people spend the more the demand goes up, et cetera.

This cycle of marketing and 'working your way to the top' (because this isn't a clockmaker process, there is a snowball effect of the popularity and demand but very few people understand that the artist has to push the snowball the entire way. Artist who do not work hard and work constantly do not taste success in a world of short attention.) is super beneficial to artists, BUT at what point do you step back and say hoooly shit someone just paid 300 dollars for something I spent 30 minutes on? You know that Ryn and I get squeamish when the dollars per hour get too high, simply because we don't see it as fair to charge so much for something we don't personally value as being worth that particular amount of money. Also because we love fairness, and making designs available for people who may not have as much money as the market's current point of 'inflation'.

But then again is it really the artist's place to stop their customers and their supporters? By setting an autobuy we are saying 'this is the maximum amount of money we are comfortable accepting for a digital product'. A customer determines the worth of a design by how much they are willing to pay for it. So by capping our auctions, we are in a way capping the overall worth of our designs within the market. So making it fair so that people CAN pay for them, we are stopping the cycle of growth, and we can't know what people WILL pay for them.

Which is funny because I say all this and then resolve myself not to change my prices at all, because though it would be wonderful to potentially earn more money for my work, there are too many issues that come from non-standardized pricing, and again the squeemishness thing.

So although people may really REAAAALLY want that dog, the worth of an adopt is based very largely on its monetary price. Ideally, the worth is determined by personal preference, however you often see that this is not the case with very high demand and even rare adopts. Generally people don't like losing money. Which I could probably go on about but I'm done with using my brain and I still have commissions to work on //OLLIES OUTTIE

You got a touch off topic a few times there beebs 8C

Gunna take your reply as 'people don't like losing money', which starts to feel as if people don't care about the adopt they're trading for anymore. They care about the money behind it... Which I suppose isn't a bad thing, and doesn't make anyone a bad person, just our views don't match up, so now it's jarring??

PERCY I WAS SO HIGH WHEN I WROTE THAT I DONT EVEN KNOW WHAT I SAID

*Gently pats head*