Now that I don't have to rely on proxies to purchase anything from it, Mercari has such a fascinatingly surreal user culture for a modern e-commerce site here in Japan that's amplified by the fact the site structure clearly isn't built for some practices.
Feel the need to ask permission to buy something that's openly listed? I don't think anybody's going to be offended if you hit the "I want to commit to giving you money in exchange for goods" button like you're on literally any other shopping site, but okay, you do you.
Want to make an offer to a seller? Do it in the public comments because there's no formal offer button elsewhere.
Made an offer the seller has accepted, but not ready to pay for it quite yet and are scared somebody else is going to snipe your item? Ask the seller to edit the title to say "For ___-sama only," because there's no way for sellers to send offers directly to individual users.
The idea of Mercari is that its limitations are both intentional and meant to make transactions feel a little more personable compared to shopping on Rakuten or Amazon. Which it is and a lot of the best deals on game stuff have come from there because it's not as big on formal stores selling on there. But when you mix in Japanese social dynamics, it all comes across as an overly (unnecessarily?) polite online flea market or swap meet. There's a quaint charm to it and for all of its other archaic aspects, the nuts and bolts of the actual transactions are straightforward enough. It's just amazing to find a part of the Internet in 2023 where sellers have to explicitly state in their listings and profiles, "You don't have to ask permission to buy anything and if you talk in the comments and someone else buys without asking, tough luck."
