i wouldnt say that its the dumbest, but i'd have to agree that it doesn't make much sense to me either.  like you said, whats the difference of a console sold today than a consolde sold tomorrow? a system sold is a system sold.  if nintendo is indeed stockpiling, it would probably hurt them more than actually boost sales.  people will wait just so long to buy a game console. either they end up spending the money on something else or the may go buy a ps3 or a 360. 

i'm still not convinced. if i bought a wii months ago, or just bought a wii today, or will buy a wii tomorrow or when sbb comes out and if i wanted ssbb, i'd still buy ssbb when it comes out. but if i dont want to buy ssbb, i still wouldnt buy it. 

and this logic is flawed

"So selling a Wii this week means revenue for Nintendo for the Wii, but selling it in the week of SSBB means revenue for the Wii AND SSBB."

so if they sell the wii when ssbb launches it means revenue for wii and ssbb during that week. but what about last week? what about the lost sales? if they sold the wii last week that would mean revenue for nintendo plus revenue for someother game for the wii and when ssbb launches, again revenue for ssbb.

so the potential to sell more software would have been lost not to mention the number of people who'd buy a differnet console (ps3 or 360or a psp or a ds)

The theory or reasoning behind stockpiling is to increase software units sold, not hardware. The people buying the consoles during March are also people who will pick up Brawl.

Of course, it could just be that Nintendo is shipping 2 weeks worth one week, then none the next. I'm not sure anymore. One thing is certain, those 1.8 million a month are somewhere, and they aren't setting on shelves, I can tell you that much.

There are still people who believe Nintendo doesn't stockpile?

http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/library/events/080125qa/index.html

Q: You said that you would be able to make 1.8 million "Wii" hardware systems per month, but you did ship 7 million during the 3rd quarter (October-December 2007). Did you ship the difference of 1.5 to 1.6 million by air?

A: We manufactured and retained some amount of hardware for the Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday season, and we also air shipped some units that were originally slated for delivery in January.

Last year it was understandable to have doubts about it (although the sales numbers were showing it already), but right now it's more than established that Nintendo does stockpile.

Please stop with the misinformation.

i understand that stockpiling's main objective is to increase software sales during the launch of a game. but this would mean that they would be shipping out less units as they will be stocking some of the units. less units shipped would mean less units sold. this would affect potential sales of other softwares and games. if demand is met or if more units are sold, more software would have been sold before ssbb launch. and when ssbb is released, lets say a week later, people will still buy it. and the time in between their purchase of the wii and other games and the launch of ssbb wuold give them sometime to get the money to buy ssbb. but if they buy the wii along side ssbb, thats all they'd buy losing the potential sales of other games.

Totally OOT: ZenfoldorVGI, i usually appreciate your posts, but about this one, i'd like to ask you to chill a little bit... most of the european people (except in UK and Ireland, of course) at least do the effort to learn a second language, english most of the time, as it's kinda universal language these days...

In my case, as i live in Belgium, it's even two, dutch (the other main official language in my country, german is the third one) and of course english... and some other people in my country, who have spanish, portugese, italian, morrocan or turkish origins, even know a total of FOUR languages...

Would you be able to answer me perfectly in french or in dutch? Do you speak a second language yourself? I write this because most americans travelling around the world speak english and english only, and always expect everyone around the globe to be able to answer them just like it's the most normal thing in the world... which it isn't...

If english was my FIRST language, i'd post most often, and would be able to do more elaborate posts with way more subtility and humor, as i'd do it in french, believe me... it's not the case, even if i try my best, but i know i wouldn't like to be called a "mongoloidian" because of my english skills, and my english skills only...

No hard feelings, but please, be a little more understanding with us, europeans who're trying their best... 

Crazy theory... But it could be possible.