Given that people are going to spend money anyway it seems more honest and reasonable to direct this money to the party that makes the thing by letting it to run auction.

You can get it at the lower price, you just have to wait. The same happens with loads of digital devices. On release day the price is higher.

If it helps you can separate it and have the first a 'ticket' in line to buy the product for the regular price. You just reserve your spot with the auction. The queue price just drops over time.

Society has found out money is a good way to encourage/discourage certain behavior in a predictable, deterministic, and quantifiable way. It really sucks that it has to be money, and maybe this can be solved with some other universal token that cannot be bought with wealth but equitably distributed some other way.

For example the dynamic fees in express lanes in California aren't really for the purposes of paying for the roads. They dynamically adjust it such that the traffic in the lane is operating at peak efficiency. Too few people using it obviously reduces throughput, so the price cheapens to have people using it, and too many people using it causes a collapse in efficiency so the price increases. Having some kind of adjustable cost on it lets the control system appropriately change the demand to keep it efficient.

I get your cynicism it would just go to billionaire shareholders, but profit itself isnt the enemy, greed is.