What does it look like from inside a hole in the sand? You haven't looked any of the stuff I linked. It explains the concept perfectly.

Between my brother and I, we went through 6 "state of the art" 360's (each had 2 die RROD, each have 1 working now).  Meanwhile, my 2007 Wii still runs like a champ.  Quality is as quality does.

You're linking opinion articles and blog posts fairly consistently. 

Your Forbes opinion piece cites Apple's iPhone 5 being backordered as an example of scarcity marketing.

Your polygon opinion article cites Apple as a company with a firm grip on supply chain management that is able to meet demand. (i.e., you can just walk into an Apple store and buy an iPhone)

Your links don't even agree with eachother. 

Nintendo shipped 18.6 million Wii's in FY 2007. What was their actual production capacity? 20 million 25 million? 30 million? 

Also, regarding Chris Grant's polygon piece, Chris should know that,

1.) Predicting the demand for the iPhone 7 based on the demand for the iPhone 6s, which launched a year prior, is comparatively easier than predicting the demand for the Wii in 2006 based on what the GameCube did in 2001.

2.) Ramping up production is probably easier when you're the most valuable company on the planet.

I don't believe Nintendo is creating artificial demand, at least not anymore. I genuinely think its a result of their suppliers cannot keep up with demand of the product and Nintendo underestimating the Switch's popularity at launch.

If people remember, during the E3 Spotlight a Nintendo rep said he was 'relieved' the Switch has been as popular as it has been. I take that as they probably weren't sure how well the Switch would sell and thus under estimated production of the system for launch (in order to save resources in case of a flop), which created the supply issues we see today. Even with them trying to correct it and ramp up supply post-launch it is not something that will instantly be seen (part order increases will have to be produced and delivered) and probably takes a couple weeks or so to actually start increasing production, beyond their old shipment numbers.

Regarding Sujan Patel, the Forbes contributor who made an unsupported claim that Nintendo shorted the Wii supply. Here is his bio:

"Sujan is the co-founder of Web Profits, a growth marketing agency, and a partner in a handful of software companies including Mailshake, Pick.co, Quuu, and Linktexting.com Between his consulting practice and his software companies, Sujan’s goal is to help entrepreneurs and marketers scale their businesses."

The founder of a "growth marketing agency" probably has a vested interest in the readers of Forbes believing that there exists secret sauces to turning your next product into a smash hit.

True. 

Also, regarding the idea that the Wii simply wasn't that difficult to manufacture, Iwata has a quote about that.

"While we are on this subject, it looks like some people are misunderstanding that Nintendo is not incorporating state-of-the-art technologies into its products. It is not true. Just as an example, we are using the state-of-the-art technologies to realize the compact-sized Wii console with low power consumption. Making a significant volume of the high-tech hardware, and making an additional volume, is not an easy task at all. In fact, when we clear one bottleneck for a production increase, we will face another one. "

He also says this:

"One thing is clear, though, that shipments will increase and that we are trying to increase the shipments in order to comply with the needs of patiently waiting customers."

I'll say it again, artificial scarcity theory relies on the idea that Nintendo is lying to investors and analysts. 

Every article of any kind is an opinion piece in reality, sherlock holmes. You're ignoring valid points just because you don't like idea that nintendo is using a well known marketing strategy to help sell their products. You'd rather go with the idea that nintendo is so incompetent that they can't produce enough product to keep up with demand even years after something has been out. There's many cases of shortages with nintendo's products. The people running nintendo for all these years must be diaper-wearing idiots if you're right.

Somehow, I'm the one out to hate on nintendo by trying explain that their repeated shortages of their products are a sign of nintendo being smart by using scarcity marketing to market their products so their sales ultimately increase.

Their production capacity is irrelevent in this context because we don't what it could upped to or lowered to based on Nintendo's tactics in marketing it. It just needs to be lower than demand for scarcity marketing to work. 

Okay, as requested, I've looked it up and I found it at the following web page:

https://www.sitepoint.com/scarcity-marketing/

And it's defined as follows:

"Scarcity marketing involves motivating people to buy something by telling them there is a shortage in what is available and a limited time to act. The goal is to create a sense of urgency through an aggressive call to action; to make people scared that they will not be able to acquire something that they want if they don’t act fast."

And an example is given:

"One of the most notable examples of scarcity marketing – the Disney Vault – started during the 1980s. Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment began to reissue limited editions of their films and urge consumers to purchase these films before they went back into the “Disney Vault.” Because each Disney film is only for a limited time before it is put in the vault and not made available for several years until it is released again, consumers are driven to act fast when a new video is released."

I'm noticing a difference however: in the Disney Vault example, Disney urges consumers to purchase these limited edition films before they go back to the "Disney Vault" helping to create a sense of urgency.

Contrast this to Nintendo that has said numerous times that it plans to up production of the Switch for the sake of meeting demand:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/nintendo-to-double-production-of-switch-console-1489728545

http://time.com/4705071/nintendo-switch-production/

https://www.ft.com/content/7edcebea-4207-11e7-82b6-896b95f30f58

http://bgr.com/2017/06/22/where-to-buy-nintendo-switch-online-shipments-increasing/

http://cogconnected.com/2017/06/nintendo-switch-shortage-apology/

http://www.ign.com/articles/2017/06/15/e3-2017-nintendo-working-to-scale-up-switch-production

As for the history of Nintendo hardware shortages, understand that a shortage can have multiple causes: supplier purposefully holding back supply is one, supplier underestimating demand is another. How does one distinguish between the two?

This brings me back to a question I asked you before and you have yet to answer: how does one distinguish between a product being scarce because the supplier is intentionally holding back supplies and a product being scarce because demand is beyond manufacturing and supply chain capabilities?

Opinion pieces are typically labeled as such by reputable outlets.

They may have a statement below the by line that looks something like this: Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

They may be titled somethign catchy like, "7 Marketing Tips to Create A Demand For Your New Product". 

News articles look more like this: https://www.wsj.com/articles/nintendo-battles-apple-for-parts-as-switch-demand-rises-1496136603

It's a Wall Street Journal article about the industry wide increase in demand for components. 

It's got all sorts of great info. Nintendo's sales target (10 million, sourced from their annual report), what they're hoping to produce (20 million according to suppliers). There is a quote in their from Toshiba about the demand for NAND flash memory being greater than what they can supply.

There is even a nice little nugget there about how Nintendo used air cargo to ship Switches in March in order to restock faster. Shipping things via air is a lot more expensive than shipping them via sea. It seems like spending more money to get more product into the market faster is kind of a silly thing to do if you're trying to restrict supply.